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The Rending of Virginia 



THE 



RENDING OF VIRGINIA, 



a Ibistor^. 



GRANVILLE DAVISSON HALL. 



"Out of the South Cometh the whirlwind.'* — J OB. 




1902. 



THE LIBRARY OF 
CONGRESS, 

Two Co«6» RecctvcB 

FEB. 1 «905 

C»fW(OKr EWTBY 

CUA8S <X XXa No. 

X V 4- ^ o 

COPY a 



Copyright, 1901, 

BY 

Granville Davisson Hall 



f^^ 



TO 

JOHN FREW, 

OF THE 

Wheeling Intelligencer, 
my former associate in business, my friend 
for forty years, whose modesty is equal- 
ed only by his other sterling virtues, 
in acknowledgment of very many 
courtesies, in appreciation 
of his friendship, and 
as a slight tribute 
to his personal 

WORTH, 
THIS VOLUME IS INSCRIBED. 



[This dedication was written, without the least intimation to Mr. Frew of my 
purpose, a few months before his death. Though earthly praise or censure can 
never be anything; to him more, this may stand, as written, a poor tribute to his 
memory J 



PRESS OF 

MAYER & MILLER 

85 FIFTH AVE. 

CHICAGO 



PREFATORY 



The design of this volume is to tell the story of the 
severance of Virginia into two commonwealths, prefac- 
ing with some account of the causes leading up to the 
event : on the one hand, the internal antagonisms Avhich 
had wrought towards disruption from an early da}' ; on 
the other, the Southern Rebellion, which involving Vir- 
ginia and setting up a military usurpation therein pre- 
cipitated the crisis between the eastern and western sec- 
tions that had been gathering head for fifty years. 

To this narrow estate has Virginia shrunken from an 
imperial domain. It is probable European eyes first be- 
held the lovely shores and waters of Virginia in 1498, 
when John Cabot is believed to have entered the Chesa- 
peake Bay. In 1584, in the nebulous days of ante-colonial 
discovery and exploration, when the boundaries and limits 
of the New World were yet undefined and when European 
monarchs were claiming "everything in sight," Raleigh's 
ships returned to England with glowing accounts of the 
region from Albemarle to Chesapeake ; and in the fervor 
of that triumphant hour, he was permitted to name all 
English North America "Virginia," in honor of the "Vir- 
gin Queen." The attempted colonization under the char- 
ter given Raleigh in that year to plant a colony in Vir- 
ginia ended in failure. He dispatched a fleet the next 



1 2 PREFATORY, 

year, but the settlers returned discouraged the year follow- 
ing. Another party sent out in 1587 perished, and per- 
manent settlement of Virginia had to wait another twenty 
years. Under James' patent of 1606, two colonies in Vir- 
ginia were authorized : one to be located by the Plymouth 
Company between 38 and 45 degrees north latitude ; the 
other between 34 and 41, with reservation of at least one 
hundred miles between them. Late in the year, Sir 
Thomas Gates set out for the southern location ; but his 
vessels were driven on the Bermudas and he did not reach 
Virginia till the following spring. It was this expedi- 
tion which, entering Hampton Roads and naming the 
river after the English King, gave the world the romantic 
(and somewhat apoehryphal) history of the adventures of 
C'apt. John Smith. Three years later the Gates grant was 
superseded by one to the London Company, on whom was 
conferred a sea front of four hundred miles north and 
south from Hampton Roads, extending "throughout from 
sea to sea." To this charter the fragmentary Virginia of 
to-day goes back for its original authority. To this Vir- 
ginia England sent out her white-handed and useless 
cavaliers, of whom Col. William Byrd of Westover, in 
his "History of the Dividing Line," wittily says that they 
were "most of them reprobates of good families," who 
"like true Englishmen built at Jamestown a church that 
cost no more than fifty pounds and a tavern that cost five 
hundred." In this book. Colonel Byrd shows how all 
English America had once been Virginia and how the col- 
onies had been carved out of it. 

By the Peace of Paris in 1763, the boundaries of Vir- 
ginia were definitel}^ fixed, with the Mississippi River for 



PEEFATOEY. 13 

the western line from the Ohio River to the Lake of the 
Woods. As time and settlement progressed, the other col- 
onies became nnwilling Virginia should overshadow them 
all by retaining this great territory ; and for the promotion 
of harmony the cession to the United States of all lying- 
north and west of the Ohio was proposed, and finally con- 
summated in 1784 — just two hundred years after the 
Elizabethan christening. Virginia made the condition 
(drawn by Jefferson) that the territory ceded should be 
divided into States in which slavery should be forever pro- 
hibited. She M'anted it stipulated, too, that the territory 
between the Ohio River and the Allegheny Mountains 
(now West Virginia) should remain inviolably hers; but 
Hon. George W. Summers, speaking from examination of 
the original Virginia archives at Richmond, said at Wheel- 
ing in 1863 that this stipulation w^as not made by Congress 
for the reason that Virginia was unable to show title to 
that territory. Mr. Madison, then in Congress, wrote to 
Jefferson to furnish the evidence of the title claimed ; but 
it could not be shown that Virginia's rights went beyond 
the springs of the waters flowing towards the Atlantic, and 
the Xorthwest Territory was finally ceded without such 
stipulation. Virginia did, however, retain possession of 
the district between the mountains and the Ohio River, 
no occasion arising to impeach her title ; and with her 
70,000 square miles, reaching from the Atlantic to the 
Ohio, still held a greater domain than any other of the 
original States. Jefferson Davis in his "Rise and Fall" 
describes Virginia as being at the opening of the Rebellion 
"a republic or nation." But relatively she was only a 
fragment of her former territorial greatn-ess. iSTor was 



Ni 



14 PEEFATOEY. 

the shrinkage in area alone. She had lost the place con- 
ferred on her in early days hj the exalted virtues of her 
great citizens, and lost also her j)rimacj in population and 
commercial importance. At the time the Constitution was 
ratified, Virginia was the foremost of the States, and in 
the census the following year showed a population more 
than double that of New York. 

Xo communities that have ever existed equal in po- 
litical and economic interest those founded on the Atlantic 
coast of Xorth America, i^one equalled Virginia in early 
develoj^ment of a stable political and religious liberty, to- 
wards which the ferment in Europe had been working ever 
since the Crusades. The Virginia act of religious free- 
dom, written by Jeiferson, is the basis of similar provisions 
in nearlv all the States of the Union. In the bill of rights 
in the first West Virginia constitution, it was embodied 
word for word. The first constitution of Virginia, adopt- 
ed in 1776, was written by George Nelson; the preamble 
to it by Mr. Jefferson. It was far from satisfying Mr. 
Jefferson's advanced ideas, but it has the distinction of 
being the first written constitution of a free state in the 
annals of the world. Mr. Jefferson left Congress in that 
year in order that he might devote all his time and ener- 
gies to a revision of the then existing Virginia code and 
to having this (legislative) constitution rewritten and 
adopted by convention in more permanent form. Four 
great changes he especially sought : To wipe out the laws 
of entail; to abolish primogeniture; to assert complete 
religious freedom ; to adopt a system of general free edu- 
cation. He also urged — and never ceased to urge while 



PKEFATOKY. 15 

he lived — a system of gradual emancipation and deporta- 
tion by which Virginia might be wholly rid not only of 
slavery but of the freed slaves as well. He also advo- 
cated citizen suffrage instead of "freehold." Mr. Jeffer- 
son had to encounter a deep-rooted aristocratic system and 
the radical reforms he proposed made slow progress; but 
to no one mind does Virginia owe so much for what she 
became in the days of her earlier gTeatness, nor perhaps 
has any one man so ineffaceably impressed his ideas on 
the whole American system. This act of religious free- 
dom, passed in 1785, made a powerful impression in 
Europe. It was translated into French and Italian, and 
had a distinct influence in promoting the French revolu- 
tion. 

A noble and enduring progress should have followed 
such an initiative in Virginia ; but on this sj)lendid graft 
of English liberty soon fell the blight of the "black plague" 
whose germ had been carried in that old Dutch man-of-war 
from Africa to Jamestown in the year 1619. 

The last riving of the old commonwealth along her 
Appalachian backbone, which is the subject of this volume, 
may be regarded as a "last analysis." It is not likely what 
is left will ever be reduced by further division. The story 
of this rending in the midst of civil tumult and confusion 
is a unique chapter in American annals. A State in the 
American Union cannot be disposed of with the same 
facility as unorganized territory. To carve a new State 
out of an old one, to clothe it %vith its prerogatives, includ- 
ing representation in the Senate, involves far more grave 



16 PREFATORY. 

and intricate considerations, even under ordinary condi- 
xi tions. To do this in the midst of a civil war threatening 
the existence of the Union itself, was a task as serious 
as any people ever had to confront. 

Xo State in the Union had ever been divided before, 
and the other conditions under which the question had 
to be met were also without precedent. The crisis was 
described by Senator Hale of J^ew Hampshire as "anom- 
alous and without precedent but destined to shed an in- 
finite light on the future." 

When the bill for the admission of West Virginia was 
before the Senate Committee on Territories, Mr. Hale, 
who was a member of the committee, said to some of the 
Wheeling gentlemen present (as related by one of them 
many years after), "in regard to what had taken place in 
Wheeling and throughout West Virginia, it was, all in all, 
a most remarkable drama — unlike anything he had ever 
heard or read of — this thing of a loyal people reclaiming 
and resuming their sovereignty after its abdication by 
their constituted authorities. 'I wish,' said he, 'somebody 
would write it up. I could not do it myself,' he added, 
'but I could appreciate it when it was written.' " 

All government in Virginia had been abdicated by 
revolt against the national authority. The first problem 
was to reclothe the abandoned functions of local govern- 
ment and re-invest authority in officers loyal to the national 
compact. This was done by reverting to the original and 
inherent rights and powers resting in the people — already 
in the Declaration of Independence declared "incapable 
of annihilation." This restoration of the Virginia gov- 
ernment was the first assertion of the indestructibility of 



PKEFATORY. 17 

an American State, affirmed by the Supreme Court of the 
United States through Chief Justice Chase some years 
later. 

The story of this restoration and of the hiter division 
founded on it has not yet been adequately told. It in- 
volves principles and facts that have not been clearly or 
widely understood. It is a story which will still, the 
author is conscious, be incompletely told in these pages. 
A contribution to that end is the most he presumes to 
offer. It is longer than the average lifetime since these 
events transpired. Xearly all who had part in them are 
dead. He who now assumes the functions of chronicler 
was a youth in the midst of that drama, knew personally 
most of the actors and had some glimpses behind the 
scenes. He regrets having put off so long the task to 
which he was j^ledged by his own intention and by the ex- 
pectation of others, to a time when most of those who 
could have a personal interest in the recital have passed 
off the stage of action. But feeling that a duty performed 
is better late than never, he sits down in later years, away 
from the theater of action, to put on paper while he still 
may some recollections, records and impressions of the 
times, incidents and persons that united to make up this 
episode. 

It being the main purpose of this work to describe the 
division of Virginia, and the Eichmond secession conven- 
tion having been only the starting point, it may seem that 
undue attention has been given to that convention. But 
that body, aside from its relation to the severance which 
followed, claims attention as a striking and powerful 



18 PKEFATORY. 

factor in the Rebellion itself. The importance of its rela- 
tion to that supreme tragedy could not well be exaggerated. 
The Cotton States had taken all the declaratory steps to- 
ward insurrection ; but they waited for Virginia to join 
them and give the signal. It was the message Roger A. 
Pryor carried to Charleston that fired the opening gun of 
the conflict ; and it was on Virginia soil beyond all other 
that the dragon teeth were sown and the deadly harvest 
reaped. 

In a swift preliminary review of slavery aggressions 
and issues, the author has sought to bring the reader down 
to the threshold of the Richmond convention with an ap- 
preciation of its relation to what had gone before. The 
course of events and evolution of issues in Northwestern 
Virginia down to the installation of West Virginia as an 
independent State are followed with careful regard to 
accuracy ; but formalities and detail are omitted where it 
seemed they could add nothing of value. The discussions 
in five conventional sessions and in the two houses of Con- 
gress are synopsized, with such comment as to make clear 
the significance of what was said and done. The aim 
has been to present as a connected story the essential facts 
within a bulk that would not be forbidding to the general 
reader. 

Facts without comment are but the skeleton of chron- 
icle. The author has deemed it a part of his task to 
clothe the skeleton with flesh and blood, by such criticism 
of measures and of men as seemed to be called for. The 
truth is not always agreeable. In polite social life, it is 
not always to be spoken. In historical statement, on the 



PREFATORY. 



19 



contrary, if we speak at all we are bound to speak the 
whole truth. 

A feature of special value is the sketch of the Rich- 
mond convention written for the author bv Hon. James 
C. McGrew, of Kingwood, one of the few surviving mem- 
bers. The author's own treatment of this convention is 
extended; but to a strong and luminous statement of its 
general features, Mr. McGrew is able to add interesting 
details from personal knowledge and experience. There 
is also some briefer comment, less studied but extremely 
crisp and pungent, by Hon. John. S. Burdett, another of 
the surviving Western Virginia members, now living at 
the State capital at the age of eighty-two. Mr. McGrew 
was eighty-seven the day he mailed his paper. Appended 
to it he gives authentic lists of the convention showing 
the entire membership and in separate lists those voting 
for and those voting against the ordinance of secession. 

Perhaps no one ought ever to offer to the public with- 
out apology anything written in the first person singular ; 
and since the writer of this book sometimes drops into 
that form of expression, he begs the indulgent reader to 
believe it is only because in such cases it seems the sim- 
plest and directest way to say what needs to be said. 

The author can hardly hope that much of value has 
not been overlooked. The work has been done under 
many disadvantages; and though it has waited long, the 
time actually given to it has been recent and brief^ The 
plan of it is limited as to both time and detail. The nar- 
rative closes with the consummation of division. Some 
general comment has been indulged on subjects not closely 
connected with the narration. This the reader may or 



20 



PEEFATORY. 



may not find pertinent. Questions arising in the new 
commonwealth during its first decade are tempting in in- 
terest; but they must be left to another time or to other 
pens. The breaking away of trans-Allegheny Virginia, 
tinder pressure of a tragedy national in its grandeur and 
its agony, is a historical phenomenon of such poignant 
interest as to merit treatment by itself. 
Glencoe, III., January 1, 1902. 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER. PAGE. 

I. A Preliminary Survey 23 

II. Internal Elements OF Disruption 29 

III. Slavery the Germ of Rebellion — Seed, Growth, 

Flower 76 

IV. The Rope of Sand — The Band of Steel 108 

V. Virginia Opens the Pandora Box 119 

VI. The Virginia Convention — Its Capture by the 

Conspiracy 141 

VII. The Northwest Confronts the Crisis 203 

VIII. The May Convention— Organizing Resistance ... 231 

IX. The Central Committee — The Election — The 

Military Joins the Issue 282 

X. The June Convention — Reorganizing the State 

Government 297 

XI. Cheerful Outlook for the New Government — 

The Legislature ; Election of Senators 337 

XII. Recognition of the Reorganized GoviJrnment by 

THE Senate 344 

XIII. The August Convention — Preparing for Divis- 

ion 347 

XIV. Part Played by the " Fourth Estate " — Division 

Voted 384 

XV. Framing the Organic Law — Its Adoption by the 

People — Legislative Consent 391 

21 



f 

22 CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER. PAGE. 

XVI. Battelle's Masterly Plea FOR A Frke State 440 

XVII. West Virginia at the Bar of the Senate 457 

XVIII. The Legislature Repudiates Senator Carlile . . 471 

XIX. West Virginia Runs the Gauntlet of the House 473 

XX. In the Hands of the President 485 

XXI. Amendment Made AND Ratified — West Virginia 

Inaugurated '. 499 

XXII. The Secession Convention Described by Surviv- 
ing Members 516 

XXIII. Some of the Men Who Figure in This History 548 

XXIV. Capture and Escape of Congressman Whale y. . . 589 

XXV. Military Value of Western Virginia in the 

War 593 

XXVI. Beneficence of War — Barbarism of Slavery. . . 599 

XXVII. Southern Views of the Movement in Northwest- 
ern Virginia 610 

XXVIII. The "Child of the Tempest" — Heir Apparent. . 614 



THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 



CHAPTER I. 

A PRELIMINARY SURVEY. 

The General Assembly of Virginia, a biennial body, 
was suddenly summoned, in vacation, to meet in Rich- 
mond January 7, 1861. 

By it, after only a week's deliberation, an election was 
ordered to be held February 4th for delegates to a State 
convention to meet in Richmond February 13th. 

It was not to be a convention of unlimited powers. In 
electing delegates, the people were allowed to vote whether 
the action of the convention, if anything should be done 
affecting the relations of the State to the Federal Gov- 
ernment, should be referred to the people for ratification 
before becoming effective ; and this question of Reference 
was affirmed by nearly sixty thousand majority. 

Although a very large majority of those chosen dele- 
gates had in their candidacy pledged themselves to be 
faithful to the Union and were chosen on the faith of such 
pledges, the convention, in secret session, passed an ordi- 
nance of secession April 17th ; and, without waiting for 
the reference of their action to the voters of the State, by 

23 



24 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

another ordinance, passed April 25th, ratified a secret 
league agreed on the day before with the Vice-President 
of the so-called Southern Confederacy, whereby the entire 
military forces and resources of the Commonwealth were 
placed instantly and absolutely at the command of the 
President of the Confederate States. Even before the 
passage of the secession ordinance, the insurrectionary 
authorities at Richmond levied war against the United 
States by the seizure of United States property at Har- 
per's Ferry, the capture of the Federal buildings at Rich- 
mond, JSTorfolk aijd Portsmouth, and the attempted seizure 
of United States ships and other naval property at Gos- 
port. 

Northwestern Virginia, indignant and alarmed, as- 
sembled a convention at Wheeling May 13th, to concert 
measures for the public safety. They declared their ad- 
hesion to the United States, denounced the action at Rich- 
mond as usurpation, illegal and void, appointed a Central 
Committee to exercise their powers in organizing resist- 
ance to the usurpation of the State government and in 
supporting the Federal Government, and provided for the 
election of a delegate convention June 4th, to meet June 
11th. 

May 23d occurred the general spring elections, at 
which were chosen members of the General Assembly, also 
members of Congress although forbidden by command 
from the rebel Governor at Richmond ; and the vote was 
taken on the question of ratifying the ordinance of se- 
cession ; the latter, under the conditions suddenly forced 
upon the State, being rather a form than a genuine ex- 
pression in three-fourths of Virginia. 



THE LOYAL REOKGANIZATION. 25 

The advance of United States troops simultaneously 
from Parkersburg- and Wheeling May 27th, cleared the 
Confederate forces out of Northwestern Virginia and left 
the people free to organize. 

June 4th, on call issued by the Central Committee, ad- 
dressed to all the loyal people of Virginia, elections were 
held for delegates to the convention to meet at Wheeling 
June 11th. The convention met at the appointed time. 
Its membership embraced the delegates specially chosen on 
the 4th and also the members of both houses of Assembly 
chosen May 23d who adhered to the United States. June 
17th this convention adopted a declaration setting forth 
that the usurpation at Richmond had driven the loyal 
people of Virginia to resume their original rights and to 
restore the Commonwealth to its proper relation to the 
United States government and declaring vacant the offices 
of all who adhered to the secession convention. A Gov- 
ernor and other State officers w^ere appointed and ordi- 
nances passed to provide for emergencies and put the ma- 
chinery of the State in motion. 

Early in July the General Assembly, embracing all 
members who refused to recognize the Richmond usurpa- 
tion, met at Wheeling to perform such part of the work 
of reorganization as devolved on that body. They elected 
two United States Senators to fill the places vacated by 
Hunter and Mason. These Senators were admitted to 
seats, as were the members of the House of Represent- 
atives chosen in the three Northwestern Virginia districts 
in May in defiance of the rebel edict. 



26 THE REXDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

Meanwhile the President of the United States had, in 
■official communications through his cabinet, recognized 
the Governor of the restored State government as the 
rightful executive of Virginia. Later, by the admission 
of Congressmen chosen at elections held under writs issued 
by Governor Peirpoint, the House of Representatives di- 
rectly recognized the Wheeling government. 

In the Rhode Island case, in 1842, it was decided by 
the Supreme Court of the United States that it rests with 
Congress to say which is the rightful organization in a 
State when there is more than one; and thus both houses 
of Congress, as well as the Executive, having accepted the 
a-cts of the reinstated government at Wheeling, its recog- 
nition as the constitutional government of Virginia was 
authoritative and complete. 

The June convention having taken a recess during the 
sitting of the General Assembly, reassembled August 6th. 
On the 20th, it passed an ordinance authorizing an elec- 
tion in certain counties in Western Virginia on the ques- 
tion of a separation from Virginia, and for the election 
of delegates at the same time to a convention to frame a 
constitution for the separated State if voted. The elec- 
tion occurred October 24th ; the vote was overwhelmingly 
in favor of division ; and the convention to frame a con- 
stitution for the new State met at Wheeling November 
26, 1861, and, having done its work, adjourned February 
18, 1862. The constitution was ratified by the people 
within the territory for which it had been made, on the 
fourth Thursday of April, by a vote practically unani- 
mous. 



THE STATE DIVIDED. Zl 



The General Assembly was reconvened May 6tli, and 
on the 13th passed an act giving the formal consent of Vir- J 
ginia to the division. This act was certified by Governor 
Peirpoint and forwarded, with a certified copy of the con- 
stitution and a memorial asking the admission of the new 
State, to Senator Willey, by whom the papers were pre- 
sented in the United States Senate May 29th. 

A bill for the admission of West Virginia passed the 
Senate July 14th, with a condition requiring that there \ 

be incorporated in the constitution a provision for gradual 
emancipation of slaves, and that the clause forbidding the 
ingress of negroes be eliminated. 

In the House of Representatives this bill was made the 
order of the day for December 9th and passed the follow- 
ing day. It was signed by the President the night of 
December 31, 1862. 

The Constitutional Convention reassembled February 
12, 1863, the emancipation provision was incorporated as 
required, in lieu of the negro-prohibition clause, and these 
amendments ratified by vote of the people ; and a certifi- 
cate of the facts sent to the President of the United States, 
who issued his proclamation April 19th declaring the ad- 
mission of West Virginia as a State in the Union complete 
sixty days thereafter. 

Meanwhile, under provision made by the convention, 
elections had been held and State officers and members of 
the Legislature for the new State chosen ; and June 20, 
1863, West Virginia was formally inaugurated at the 
Linsley Institute, in the city of Wheeling, the Virginia 
Executive removing with the archives of restored Vir- 
ginia to Alexandria. 



28 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

The equitable grounds on which the separation was 
demanded by the West ; the story of the rebellion at Rich- 
mond producing the crisis which brought to Western Vir- 
ginia the long-desired opportunity; the work of restoring 
civil government by the loyalists west of the mountains ; 
the subsequent fight for the new State at Wheeling, and 
again at Washington ; . the opposition of foes and the 
treachery of pretended friends ; the final victory — all this 
and something more is told in the chapters which follow. 



CHAPTEE n. 

INTERNAL ELEMENTS OF DISRUPTION. 

A HALF CENTURY OF HEARTBURNINGS. 

The discontent in the Virginia household which re- 
sulted in the sejDaration in 1863 was not of recent origin 
nor due to ephemeral causes. It was a case of natural in- 
compatibility, and of other incompatibility increasing with 
time and growth. Dissensions, growing with the devel- 
opment of the West, and unwise and oppressive policies 
on the part of the dominant East, had long been preparing 
the soil and sowing the seed for the crop which was finally 
reaped. 

THE PROTEST OF NATURE. 

Mountain barriers had been reared by nature between 
the two sections. On one side of them the waters flowed 
toward the old w^orld of vested privilege ; on the other 
toward the new, the free, the possibilities of the future 
and the unknown. Commerce divides with the water-sheds 
and flows with the streams. The interests and purposes of 
men follow commercial lines. Political abstractions may 
at times seem the most influential spring of action ; but 
business advantage has the strong and steady pull which 
in the end shapes the destinies of States. 

29 



30 THE EENDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

Policies siij^posed to be suited to the east side of these 
mountains were ill adapted to the other. Under the meas- 
ures enforced bv the East, at the instance of an institution 
repugnant to the people in the West, the latter could only 
grow more and more discontented and alienated as time 
and material growt'^ made the Eastern rule the more op- 
pressive. The connection was an unnatural one from the 
first. It grew to be a union of force which only awaited 
its opportunity to be broken. 

THE PRIMITIVE WEST. 

The earliest settlements west of the mountains were 
made by the more adventurous east of them, who had lit- 
tle of property or anything else to attach them to the soil 
they grew on and sought the freer life of what were then 
the Western wilds. Later, as the country became cleared, 
a more substantial class followed with their slaves in pur- 
suit of agriculture. This inflow across the mountains was 
met by currents of a different kind of people flowing in 
from the northern and western borders. In the decades 
between 1840 and 1860, under the demand for slave labor 
in the Gulf States, the bulk of the slave population in the 
West went to the market. 

NO UNITY OF INTEREST. 

As commercial and industrial interests developed 
there, they found their outlets west and south, through 
channels prepared by nature. There was little intercourse 
of any kind — and even less commerce — with Eastern Vir- 
ginia. A single railroad reaching only the northern sec- 
tion carried trafiic to tidewater beyond the State. None 



walpole's coloxy. 31 

of it went to Eastern Virginia. Attempts were made to 
connect the southern section of the West with the East by 
railroad, but had not been successful down to the opening 
of the war. Less than half a million had been expended 
in grading the western section of the Covington and Ohio 
Railroad, though between four and five millions had been 
spent in trying to tunnel the mountain in Tazewell 
County ; and some meager improvements had been made in 
navigation on Coal, Kanawha and Guyandotte Rivers — 
fragments of that costly but fruitless system of Virginia 
public works described by Governor Wise in 1857 as ''be- 
ginning everywhere and ending nowhere." If Eastern 
Virginia and Western had been separate commonwealths, 
there could hardly have been less of business and social in- 
tercourse than there was. The political bond which united 
them was always galling to the West ; and for more than 
fifty years there were bickerings and strifes so bitter that 
they sometimes threatened violence. The differences were 
of a kind that might be borne but could never be recon- 
ciled. The matter of separation was only one of time and 
opportunity. The mills of God grind slow, but patience 
brings the last grist to its turn. 

WALPOLe's western VIRGINIA COLONY. 

A curious chapter on the status in early colonial times 
of the territory now embraced in West Virginia was re- 
lated by Hon. George W. Summers in an address in the 
old court-house at Wheeling, in August, 1863. West Vir- 
ginia was then less than two months old. Mr. Summers 
had come out of his retirement to make some explanations 



32 THE RE^VDI^^G OF VIRGINIA. 

in palliation of his course following his return from the 
first session of the Richmond convention to the Kanawha 
Valley. The new State having achieved success without his 
help, he had become its ardent friend ; and he closed this 
speech with some gratulatory remarks about the erection of 
West Virginia. The following jDassage is now deciphered 
from the short-hand notes taken at the time : 

I suppose we have all been thinking we have done some new 
thing in making a State here between the Alleghenies and the 
Ohio River. I tell you, my friends, it "was in contemplation, and 
was within an ace of accomplishment, within four years of a 
hundred years ago. 

After the treaty of Paris, in 1763, by which England ac- 
quired the Canadas from France — all the claims of France to this 
Western country — Walpole and others applied for a charter for a 
colony "back of Virginia," to begin opposite the mouth of the 
Scioto River, running back to the Allegheny ridge, thence up to 
somewhere about Pittsburgh, including all the lands between 
the ridges of the Allegheny and the Ohio River. At that time, 
the bounds of Virginia were not conceded to go beyond the head 
springs of the rivers flowing into the Atlantic. All beyond was 
claimed at one time by France, who placed her monuments at 
the mouths of many of our rivers — one at the mouth of the 
Kanawha and one at the mouth of the Muskingum, I remember, 
in 1749. 

This conception of Walpole and others proceeded so far that 
in 1769 a charter was made out for this colony by Hillsborough, 
then foreign secretary; who wrote a letter on the subject, which 
I have had access to and read, to the Governor and Council of 
Virginia, proposing this new colony and asking their views on 
the subject. There is a letter extant written by Mr. Nelson, 
President of the Council, in which he tells his Lordship he had 
received his letter and laid it before the Council; that it did 
not become the Council to advise His Majesty on such a sub- 
ject, but that when the country should become sufficiently popu- 
lated for a colony "back of Virginia" — not claiming it as Virginia 
at all — they could well concede it would be proper to do so. 



SEPARATION PREDICTED. 33 

The charter was prepared and was ready for signature of 
the Crown officer; when the events of the Revolution thiclcening 
upon them, it was suspended and cut olf. It only escaped be- 
coming a separate and independent colony from the Allegheny to 
the Ohio River by that chance. 

I do not mention it as showing that it was not a part and 
parcel of Virginia, because by subsequent events and the recogni- 
tion of the boundaries of the State, it might be regarded as a 
settled question. Although for one who has a mind to look into 
antique discussions it is a very curious fact that when Virginia 
was bargaining with Congress about the cession of her North- 
western domain — the lands northwest of the Ohio — she made 
it a uniform condition of her grant of these lands that Congress 
should guarantee to her the lands east of the Ohio River — that is, 
the lands between the Ohio and the Allegheny Mountains; which 
Congress uniformly refused to do. During that discussion, Madi- 
son, then member of Congress, wrote to Jefferson to furnish him 
the proofs of the right of Virginia to the lands west of the Al- 
legheny: and they never were furnished by Mr. Jefferson; and 
finally the cession was made without this guaranty. 

In this speech Mr. Summers claimed that twenty-five 
years before he had advocated the division of Virginia 
and had "perhaps done more to familiarize the public 
mind with the idea of such division than any man in the 
State." All the more pity that he did not keep to that 
faith when time and event had ripened the fruit ! 

WEBSTER PREDICTS DIVISION. 

The character of the tie that bound Western Virginia 
to Eastern was recognized by intelligent men outside the 
State as well as within. Daniel Webster took notice of it 
in his speech on the occasion of the laying of the corner- 
stone of fhe addition to the jSTational Capitol, in 1851, 
when he warned the people of Virginia against the dis- 
union issue which had been raised by Calhoun : 

Va.— 3 



34 THE EE^^DIXG OF VIEGIIJ^IA. 

Ye men of Western Virginia, who occupy the slope from the 
Alleghenies to the Ohio and Kentucky, what benefit do you pro- 
pose to yourselves by disunion? Do you look for the current 
of the Ohio to change and bring you and your commerce to the 
tide-waters of Eastern rivers? What man in his senses would 
suppose that you would remain a part and parcel of Virginia a 
month after Virginia ceased to be a part and parcel of the 
United States? 

Henry Winter Davis, of Maryland, in the course of 
an address to his constituents, declared that "West Vir- 
ginia belongs to the Mississippi Valley. Virginia can 
never withdraw from the existing confederacy undivided." 

THE TORTOISE IN ITS SHELL. 

Eastern Virginia always possessed a full endowment 
of the selfishness and blindness to its own true interests 
inherent in aristocratic communities. The aristocrat 
takes in only the little circle of which he deems himself 
the center, regarding all outside of it alien or hostile. 
Virginia was controlled by the belief that its narrow, pe- 
culiar society and civil system, based on slave labor and 
English tradition, was the flower of political and social 
wisdom. The commoner people in the West, growing in 
harmony with the genius of the great free Republic, were 
regarded as inimical to Eastern interests ; and accordingly 
the East sought to keep this "peasant" population under 
due control by repressive provisions, constitutional and 
statutory, denying them- their due share in representation 
and imposing on them more than their due share of the 
taxes. 

The settlement of Virginia beginning at the tide-water 
and spreading westward, the older section naturally and 



THE NOETHWEST AGGRIEVED. 35 

always made the newer their tributary. In the Revolu- 
tionary period, Mr. Jefferson found occasion to complain 
that the Tide-water district possessed great advantages in 
representation over the interior where he had his home. 
This inequality was always maintained at the expense of 
the outlying West. 

The limitation of suffrage to land-holders was an aris- 
tocratic feature imposed on the colony under the second 
Charles in 1677; and it was maintained till the conven- 
tion of 1850-1, when the West had grown so strong the 
East was compelled to make some concessions. In the 
matter of an aristocratic land-suffrage, Rhode Island re- 
ceived a like heritage from the "merry" and dissolute 
Charles II. ; and the people there endured the restriction 
nearly as long as in Virginia. The Dorr rebellion in 
1842 was a revolt against it. A portion of the people of 
Rhode Island despairing of other means of relief organ- 
ized a convention, framed a liberal constitution and 
formed a State government under it. It was put down by 
the legitimate State authority with the aid of the military 
power of the United States, and Dorr was imprisoned. 
But he was vindicated soon by the action of a convention 
assembled by the regular authorities which framed a con- 
stitution conceding the reforms for which he had organ- 
ized revolt. There was a time when it seemed not im- 
possible some such insurrection might arise in Virginia. 

THE NORTHWEST FILES COMPLAINT. 

As early as 1829 the grievances of the West were felt 
to be so intolerable as to demand redress. In the House 
of Representatives, in 1862, when the bill for the admis- 
sion of West Virginia was under discussion, Hon. William 



36 THE REXDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

G. Brown, from the Preston district, said that when the 
Virginia convention of 1829-30 met, Western Virginia 
was on the point of revolution. In that convention a sharp 
protest was filed by the Xorthwest through two of the 
ablest men the West had ever sent to Richmond : Alex- 
ander Campbell and Phillip Doddridge. Old Virginia 
had in that body some of her historic figures — James 
Madison, James Monroe, Chief Justice Marshall and John 
Randolph of Roanoke. Benjamin Watkins Leigh was 
there. It was he who had described the white people west 
of the mountains as "peasantry." "What real share, so 
far as mind is concerned," asked Mr. Leigh, "could the 
peasantry of the West be supposed to take in the affairs of 
the State ?" Before the adjournment of this convention 
Mr. Leigh probably found the answer to his question ; for 
at least the two peasant members from the Panhandle 
were able to measure intellectual swords with the ablest 
men the East had in that body. 

THE CONVENTION OF 1829-30. 

This convention holds a place in the history of Vir- 
ginia dissension which calls for something more than pass- 
ing mention, j^o body of equal gravity, nor of equal in- 
fluence on the affairs of the State, assembled in Virginia 
between the convention of 1788, which ratified the Con- 
stitution of the United States, and the equally historic one 
which in 1861 tried to repeal that ratification. Certainly 
none equalling this as typical of Virginia greatness. 
Washington and Jefferson had departed, but a number be- 
longing to the same era remained and took part. 



CONVENTION OF 1829-30. 37 

SUFFRAGE THE FOCUS. 

While the. local interests of every part of the broad 
Commonwealth were represented and discussed, the main 
issue in the convention seemed to be very distinctly felt 
from the first; and from the beginning it was a drawn 
battle between East and West over the burning question 
of suffrage. At this distance of time it seems startling to 
recognize the irrepressible conflict between the two sec- 
tions as it showed itself in openly expressed fear of divi- 
sion and the free handling of the question of disruption 
so long ago. The wonder arises that with such discordant 
elements, such outspoken discontent and hostility to an 
existing order of things within its borders, it was possible 
for the Old Dominion to hold the West under its domina- 
tion so long, before the crisis arrived which settled the 
question of division at once and forever. Alarm and ex- 
citement were not only shown in debate but appeared also 
in the "instructions" and "memorials" sent up to the con- 
vention by the people. Chief Justice Marshall was 
charged with "a memorial from the non-freeholders of the 
city of Richmond," and another from "a highly respect- 
able body of citizens in Fairfax County;" the burden of 
one and all being "an extension of the right of suffrage." 
An exceptional memorial was one regarding slavery which 
will be quoted further along. 

These were from the East. From the West came no 
written memorials, for there were those from that section 
who were there to present in person the demands of their 
people — to fight rather than to pray. 



38 THE EE]S^DIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

SLAVERY AT THE BOTTOM. 

It is apparent, in looking over the chronicles of this 
convention, that the question underlying all these surface 
differences was the issue of slavery in Virginia. All the 
able men in the convention, East and West, knew this. 
They foresaw from afar the coming conflict, and recog- 
nized, however reluctantly, that nothing could be per- 
manently amended between the two sections until that 
which was the beginning and end of the whole conflict had 
been settled. Like the watch which in spite of everybody 
persisted in keeping wrong time till the magnet secreted 
near the mainspring had been discovered, nothing could 
go right in Virginia till the concealed but evil influence 
of slavery had been removed. Other questions might.come 
and go, other causes be lost or won ; but while this wrong- 
remained as a basis of injustice and irritation, it would 
rankle and breed fresh dissension from year to year, until 
East and West should be rent asunder in fact as they had 
long been in feeling. 

TWO PANHA]!^DLE IXNOVATOES, 

West Virginia, now in the day of her accomplished 
freedom, has no need to be ashamed of the men who stood 
np for her rights and pleaded her cause in the convention 
of 1829-30. If they did not directly demand separation, 
they laid the foundation on which it was afterwards built. 
Campbell and Doddridge stood side by side on all ques- 
tions of importance affecting Western interests and rights ; 
and by their fearlessness and force in advocating reform 
and demanding redress, more than once challenged the 



ALEXANDER CAMPBELL^ THE LEADER. 39 

attention of some of the great names on the other side, 
notably John Randolph, whose crabbed astuteness per- 
ceived the full force of their position but refused to recog- 
nize it as persistently and contemptuously as he refused 
to look beyond the limits of "Old" Virginia for his po- 
litical or social creed. 

At the time this convention was held, the Virginia 
"Panhandle," represented by Campbell and Doddridge, 
was divided into but two counties — Ohio, embracing what 
is now Ohio and Marshall ; and Brooke, now divided into 
Brooke and Hancock. The Monongalia district, then em- 
bracing that county, Preston and Taylor, was represented 
by Charles S. Morgan and Eugenius Wilson ; Kanawha 
district by Lewis Summers, Edwin S. Duncan of Harri- 
son, John Laidly of Cabell and Adam See of Randolph. 
Altogether it was a notable representation of the ideas 
and aspirations then liberalizing the Northwest; but it 
proved powerless before the aristocratic dogmatism of the 
old regime. Alexander Campbell seems to have natur- 
ally taken the leadership of the Western members and the 
championship of their cause. It was the only occasion in 
his long public career when he took part in what might be 
called politics ; and more for this reason than any other, 
perhaps, his conspicuous part in this convention has in the 
long interval since been in a great measure lost sight of. 
Mr. Campbell was a man of very unusual energy and 
powTr ; not only a thinker but a man of action ; not only 
a master of theological knowledge and polemics — the 
founder and propagandist of a new faith— but a man of 
affairs also, who could build a great college, farm in a 



40 THE KEXDIXG OF VIRGIICIA. 

large and successful wav, edit religious journals, and dis- 
cuss religious dogma with the ablest theologians of his 
time. If he had chosen to give his energies to political 
life, he must have been heard from in other bodies in Vir- 
ginia than the one whose chronicle we are dealing with. 
As a man of affairs in that bodv, Mr. Campbell knew the 
interests of his section and people and could adequately 
represent them among the law-makers at Richmond. As a 
thinker and student of political and economic questions, 
he thoroughlv comprehended the issue between the East 
and West ; and on the declaration of the bill of rights, 
and on the question of the suffrage, he took high and firm 
ground. His oratory, like his personal appearance, was 
commanding and impressive and his utterance marked by 
earnestness and fearlessness. It was not the oratory of 
the politician or man of expediency. It was of the kind 
that remains on record as the truth which is forever true; 
the truth which was in its day far-seeing, prophetic, and 
which has since that day come to pass. John Randolph 
had no liking for the big Western preacher, whose view 
of things was so broadly different from his own. One day, 
possibly for lack of a better reply to some of Mr. Camp- 
bell's remarks, Randolph asked him : "With whom have 
you left those few sheep in the wilderness ?" in rude allu- 
sion to My. Campbell's calling as a clergyman. Mr. Ran- 
dolph did not and could not realize that that "wilderness" 
was one day to blossom as the rose, and that Mr. Camp- 
bell's own county of Brooke would become famous for its 
sheep, shearing the finest merino wool in the world, while 
Mr. Randolph's section, though engaged in wool-growing 
of another kind and grade, was destined never to win 
either wealth or enviable renown by reason of its product. 



PHIL. DODDRIDGE DEMAXDS WHITE BASIS. 41 

BASIS OF KEPKESENTATION. 

Phillip Doddridge, an eminent lawyer, a represent- 
ative in the State Legislature and in Congress ; a man of 
distinguished literary achievement best known to. the 
world of letters by his ''Notes on the Early Settlement of 
Xorthwestern Virginia," and his "Indian Wars," pub- 
lished at Wellsburg, Va., in 1824, offered a resolution 
declaring that in the apportionment of representation in 
the House of Delegates, regard should be had to the white 
population exclusively. This would have been but half 
a loaf, the Senate remaining on the aristocratic land-and- 
slave basis. But even this half-loaf was not to be con- 
ceded for another twenty .years. During the discussion 
following Mr. Doddridge's proposition, Mr. Campbell sup- 
ported it; and we note one paragraph as illustrating the 
great preacher's breadth of thought and manner of speech : 

The policy of those gentlemen who advocate the money basis 
appears to me not only unrepublican but short-sighted. That 
policy which augments the power of wealth, which tends to make 
the rich man richer and the poor man poorer, is the worst 
policy for such a community as this, and must be at least for 
some time to come. My views of men and of the revolutions in 
human affairs make me a republican. My love for my own 
posterity would prevent me from voting for this amendment, if 
I had no other consideration to govern me. If I had the wealth 
of Stephen Girard, I could not, feeling as I do — viewing human 
affairs as I do; looking back into history or forward into 
futurity — consent to build up an aristocracy, because I should 
be erecting embankments and bulwarks against those dearer to 
rne than myself. I do most sincerely wish that gentlemen would 
look a little before them and remember the lot of man, lest they 
should, in attempting to secure themselves from imaginary evils 
lay the foundation of real and lasting ones. 



42 THE REXDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

THE EOGIC OF FIGURES. 

The fact that the West was growing awa}' from the 
influence and control of slavery and its code of ideas, as 
sharply evinced in the audacious demand for a more lib- 
eral constitution, was held by the Egyptian taskmasters 
to show the need of a more restrictive plan of representa- 
tion, not a more liberal one. Randolph adduced tigures 
which showed that the progress in the West was becoming 
dangerous to Eastern control. As exhibiting the relative 
growth of the two sections, he brought forward statistics 
showing that in 1700 the white population east of the Blue 
Ridge was 314,523, west of it 127,594; and that in 1829 
this had increased in the East to only 362,745, and in the 
West to 319,516. In these thirty-nine years the rate of 
growth in the East had been something over fifteen per 
cent ; in the West one hundred and fifty per cent. In the 
district lying between the Ohio and the Alleghenies the 
increase had been from 38,834 in 1790 to 181,384 in 
1829 — nearly 370 per cent. In Virginia, as elsewhere, it 
thus clearly appeared the star of em])ire was taking its 
way Westward. 

Randolph could point out these evidences of decadence 
in the East, wdiere slavery sat like a nightmare on the 
breast of popular energy, and of growth in the wilder and 
ruder West, where the people were comparatively free from 
the incubus ; but neither he nor his eminent compeers, 
despite their great names, w^ere capable of making the ap- 
plication of the facts. They could not see that the remedy 
needed to be applied to the East, not to the West. They 



VALUE OF A WHITE CITIZEN. 43 

saw nothing to do. but to continue their antediluvian sys- 
tem framed wholly in the interest of a slave-holding rule. 
When Alexander Campbell sought to have incorporated 
in the constitution provisions which would modify — not 
abolish — the antiquated county-court, in which in every 
county a small number of men ignorant of the law were 
invested with judicial functions in addition to fiscal — in 
violation of a fundamental principle of the American sys- 
tem, under which the three departments of government 
are sacredly separate — Randolph attacked the proposition 
so vehemently, with so much sarcasm, and had so sym- 
pathetic an old-fogyism to appeal to, that the proposition 
was defeated. 

THE EAST "stands PAT." 

f 

As to citizen suffrage, the East would not have it. 
They stood together, apparently thinking their only se- 
curity against the growing mob of white people west of 
the mountains was to disfranchise them. These gentlemen 
were even then sitting on the safety-valve but could not 
realize it. They thought to offset the growth of popula- 
tion in the West by keeping unlimited control of legisla- 
tion, effecting that by basing representation on property 
and limiting the franchise to land-holders. "Do you 
know how much a white man was worth under that old 
constitution?" asked Mr. Van Winkle in the first West 
Virginia constitutional convention. The unit of repre- 
sentation in 1850 was $532 of property. That is, as Mr. 
Van Winkle put it, "a white man was worth $532 ;" which 
was considerably below the market value of a "likely" 



44 THE BENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

negro. That much property — negro pr other — had the 
same weight in the government as the white citizen. Be- 
sides, the white citizen was liable to be disfranchised for 
omission to pay twelve and one-half cents taxes — and the 
property was not. 

DIVISION IN SHADOW. 

The question of dividing Virginia was not brought 
tangibly before this convention. It was not advocated or 
threatened by anybody. But it was in the thoughts of 
members, who saw whither all this conflict of interest and 
opinion tended ; and it was spoken of with bated breath 
by gentlemen of such conservatism and dignity as Monroe 
and Marshall. It was execrated by Randolph. By all, 
such a contingency was deplored. The talk of the West- 
ern men was without doubt, suggestive of revolt and was 
denounced as such by Randolph and others. Revolutions 
often result from such discussions as went on in that con- 
vention — and such conditions as provoked them. The 
revolution some of these fathers of the Commonwealth 
seem to have foreseen came and did its work midway be- 
tween that day and this. The truth they spoke was the 
seed of the event, and the fruit remains with us. They 
uttered prophecies which time has interpreted. They were 
wise in their day ; they were faithful to the gospel of 
equal rights, and the event has vindicated them. 

ELOQUENT PROTEST AGAINST SLAVERY. 

There were men in Vii-ginia at that Jay who under- 
stood the cause of her paralysis and had the Cdurago to 
declare it. Slavery had not yet throttled free oi)iiiioii or 



PKOTESTING AGAINST SLAVERY. 45 

free speech, as it did later. A memorial presented to the 
convention in October, 1829, said that Virginia was in a 
"state of moral and political retrogression," and proceeded 
to specify: 

That the causes heretofore frequently assigned are the true 
ones we do not believe. . . . We humbly suggest our belief 
that the slavery which exists and which with gigantic strides is 
gaining ground among us, is, in truth, the great efficient cause 
of the multiplied evils we deplore.- We cannot conceive that 
there is any other cause sufficiently operative to paralyze the 
energies of a people so magnanimous, to neutralize the blessings 
of Providence included in the gift of a land so happy in its soil, 
its climate, its minerals and its waters; and to annul the mani- 
fold advantages of our republican system and geographical posi- 
tion. If Virginia has already fallen from her high estate, and 
if we have assigned the true cause for her fall, it is with the 
utmost anxiety that we look to the future, to the fatal termina- 
tion of the scene. As we value our domestic happiness, as our 
hearts yearn for the prosperity of our offspring, as we pray for 
the guardian care of the Almighty over our country — we earn- 
estly inquire what shall be done to avert the impending ruin. 
The efficient cause of our calamities is vigorously increasing in 
magnitude and potency while we wake and while we sleep. 

Thirty years brought the beginning of the "fatal termi- 
nation of the scene" thus graphically forecast in this 
memorial. It was no small faction whose opinions thus 
found expression. At that time in Virginia such views 
were still widely entertained. The teachings of Jefferson 
and George Mason had not yet been discredited. Wash- 
ington in 1796 wrote to Sir John Sinclair, in England, 
accounting for the greater value of land in Pennsylvania 
than in Maryland and Virginia, that it was "because there 
were laws in Pennsylvania for gradual emancipation of 
slaverv which neither of the two States above-mentioned 



'v\ 



46 THE BENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

Lave, at present but whicli nothing is more certain than 
that they must have and at a period not remote." George 
Mason said in the Federal Congress, of the African slave- 
trade, that "this infernal traffic originated in the avarice 
of the British merchants," He might have added "and 
British monarchs," for Queen Anne and two of the 
Georges put the profits of this "infernal traffic" into their 
private purses as stockholders in companies chartered by 
them to carry it on. Even this was not the worst exhibi- 
tion of English monarchy — if anything could be worse; 
for Queen Elizabeth, as Macaulay relates, when 841 white 
convicts were condemned to servitude in the West Indies, 
asked that 100 of them might be given to her; and she 
cleared a profit of a thousand guineas on the cargo! 

The best people of Virginia had not yet been converted 
to the new gospel of slavery which had found its inspira- 
tion in the cotton gin. The new shibboleth was put into 
words by the committee of the convention which sat in 
Richmond thirty years later. "African slavery" they 
said, "is a vital part of the social system of the State 
wherein it exists." 

TESTIMONY OF THE WISE. 

"Wliat a stupendous, what an incomprehensible ma- 
chine is man !" wrote Jefferson from France when he 
learned his proposed amendment for gi'adual emancipa- 
tion had not been embodied in the revised code of Vir- 
ginia — "Who can endure toil, famine, stripes, imprison- 
ment, and death itself, in vindication of his liberty, and 
the next moment be deaf to all those motives whose power 



PEOTESTIKG AGAIjSTST SLAVERY. 4Y 

supported him through his trial, and inflict on his fellow- 
men a bondage one hour of which is fraught with more 
misery than ages of that which he rose in rebellion to 
oppose." As late as 1821, when 77 years old, Jefferson 
wrote : 

It was found the public mind would not bear tbe proposi- 
tion. Nor will it bear it even to this day. Yet the day is not 
distant when it must bear it and adopt it, or worse will follow. 
Nothing is more certainly written in the book of fate than that 
these people are to be free. . . . It is still in our power to 
direct the process of emancipation and deportation peaceably. 
. . , If, on the contrary, it is left to force itself on, human- 
nature must shudder at the prospect. 

George Mason had put his convictions on record in 
these words : 

Slavery discourages arts and manufactures. The poor 
despise labor when performed by slaves. They prevent the im- 
migration of whites, who really enrich and strengthen a country. 
They produce the most pernicious effect on manners. Every 
master of slaves is born a petty tyrant. They bring the judg- 
ment of heaven on a country. By an inevitable chain of causes 
and effects. Providence punishes national sins by national calam- 
ities. 

Prophetic words, soon realized after Virginia and 
South Carolina undertook to propagate the new gospel 
with the edge of the sword ! 

Henry Clay, born and reared in Virginia, agreed with 
her older statesmen. "Slavery," he said, "is a curse to 
the master and a grievous wrong to the slave." 

Dr. Henry Ruffner, of Kanawha, who died at Charles- 
ton about the close of 1861, had more than once ap- 
pealed to the anti-slavery traditions of Virginia against 



48 THE JJENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

the later propagandism. "Our own Western Virginia," 
he said, "furnishes conclusive evidence that slavery in all 
quantities and degrees has a pernicious influence on the 
public welfare." 

In the United States Senate, in July, 1862, Charles 
Sumner, in opposing the admission of West Virginia witli 
a constitution recognizing slavery, said "there might not 
be many slaves, but it takes very little slavery to make a 
slave State with all the virus of slavery ;" and he refused 
to vote to increase the representation from slave States 
in the Senate. Thus Mr. Sumner reinforced Dr. Ruffner's 
idea regarding the potency of a small leaven of the evil 
institution. The history of Western Virginia well illus- 
trates the thought, as will more strongly appear when we 
come to the struggle over the question in framing the 
first constitution for the new State. 

It illustrates the changed attitude of Virginia to note 
that John Tyler when in the Senate, in 1832, in a bill for 
the government of the District of Columbia incorporated 
a provision for the abolition of slavery therein. In 1861 
he was hand in glove wdth the secession conspiracy and 
was one of the "Peace Commissioners" who protested 
against possible abolition in the District. 

INSPIRATION OF THE COTTON GIN. 

It appears that even when these memorialists were 
praying that old convention to arrest the evil of slavery, 
the institution was rousing itself like a giant refreshed 
with new wine under stimulation due to the cotton-gin. 
The growing demand for slave labor in the culture of 



VIRGINIANS TRAFFIC I2J NEGROES. 49 

cotton and sugar offered Virginia a new industry at a 
time when her other industries had broken down, and the 
profit of breeding them for the market soon reconciled 
her people to the wrong and silenced all dissentients. 
There is a wide difference between a w^rong which yields 
a profit and one that does not. As Pope remarks of 
another monster of frightful mien, they learned to 

— "first endure, then pity, then embrace." 

Tlie breeding of negroes was more lucrative than breeding 
cattle, or raising tobacco, and not so exhaustive of the 
soil. There was a good deal of cross-breeding, and a 
large percentage of the human stock shipped to the Gulf 
States bore the best blood of the F. F. V. In the con- 
vention of 1829-30 it was stated by a member that the 
value of slave exports from Virginia had then reached 
$1,500,000 per annum. Four years later it had risen to 
$10,000,000! Values rose with the increased demand, 
lion. James IT. Hammond, U. S. Senator of South Caro- 
lina, in a speech delivered at Barnwell Court House, S. C, 
in October, 1858, showing the prosperity of the slave 
iDstitution, said : "In this very quarter o^ a century our 
slaves have doubled in numbers and each slave has more 
than doubled in value. , The very negro who, as a prime 
laborer, would have brought $400 in 1828, would now, 
with thirty years more upon him, sell for $800." 

DOMESTIC SLAVE-TRADE. 

This domestic slave-trade was active in Western Vir- 
ginia, though far less important there than in the East. 
When the writer of these pages was a boy, there was, 

Va.--4 




'• THE REXDIXG OF VIKGINIA. 



aboTit three miles east from Clarksburg, near the home of 
aMi^t-ingiiished ex-Governor of Virginia then living, a 
negro'''ranch''' where young negroes, from mere children 
upward, were corralled, ranged and fed for the Southern 
market, almost as if they had been sheep or swine. In 
summer, the younger ones ran about in puris naturalibus, 
clothing for them being deemed a needless expense. There 
are people yet living in Harrison who will remember this 
establishment, though the proprietor, like the Legrees 
and all of his kind, has long ago gone "the primrose way." 
This human stock-yards was the consummate flower of 
the patriarchal institution which Xorthwestern Virginia 
was fighting to get away from ; which some of her able 
politicians found it so heartbreaking to give up when the 
crisis was on us in 1861 ! 

The author's mother distinctly remembers Avlien she 
was a child of nine or ten seeing a great drove of negroes 
pass her home, on the ''State Road," about where Cherry 
Camp station now is on the Xorthwestern Virginia line 
of the Baltimore k Ohio Railroad, on their way to the 
Ohio River, it is to be presumed, for transport down the 
river by flat-lioat. There were women and children, as 
well as men, and a few teams probably carrying pro- 
visions. The men were chained together. She recalls that 
the drove seemed a long time passing and thinks there 
were several hundred. This was about 1826 or 1827. 

In Les Miserables, Victor Hugo describes the passage 
of a gang of galley-slaves leaving Paris one chill morning 
from the Bicetre — a spectacle so lamentable as to express 
every conceivable human degradation and wretchedness. 
After they have passed, little Cosette with trembling asks: 




THE TABLES TURNED. 

"Father, are they still men ?" "Sometimes," Jean Vai^^iin 
replies. He is thinking of himself and rememberifig iliat 
thirty-five year's before he had passed the barriei^^Ti a like 
gang, with the gyves on his wrists and the collasr]jpi his 
neck. 

Here there was at least the presumption of crime to 
mitigate the horror of the scene; but with that long 
caravan of black people, chained together like cattle, 
destined to a servitude as cruel and more irrevocable and 
hopeless than the galleys, there was not even the element 
of alleged crime to temper the awful tragedy. 

"put youbself in his place." 

In one of the popular magazines, in the summer of 
1897, was told a story which illustrates some features 
and possibilities of this domestic slave-trade. It was 
related that, in 1845, at Yorktown, Virginia, by the death 
of a young man whose name is given, the last in the male 
line of an old family, the family was broken and their 
slaves sent to the block. One of these had been the body- 
servant of his young master, and very likely of kindred 
blood, for one was as white as the other ; had been reared 
with him from infancy; "had enjoyed the same advan- 
tages, and through association with the best society of 
many countries had acquired an ease of manner and 
fluency of speech, which, combined with his handsome 
person, would have made him an ornament in any circle. 
Tliere was so little negro blood in his veins he would have 
passed as a white man anywhere, and was held in high 
esteem by his master and all his friends." A burly slave- 
dealer, whose name is given as James Hubbard, and who 



52 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

is described as a man of "powerful physique, coarse man- 
ners, hair and eyes intensely black, and complexion so 
swarthy he would have suffered by comparison with many 
of his human chattels," had long had his eye on "Mack," 
and when it came to the auction, he ran the price so high 
that Mack became his property. Hubbard took his chattel 
to New Orleans; but, actuated apparently by vanity, 
instead of selling him, he kept Mack as his body servant, 
dressing him like a gentleman and allowing him the 
greatest freedom. Mack had some money, and, keeping 
out of his master's way, he frequented saloons and gam- 
bling places where he passed for. a Virginia planter and 
made some acquaintances among the fast set. The story 
relates that walking on the street one evening with one 
of these, his master passed by on the other side of the 
street. 

"You see that boy over there f said Mack carelessly, 
indicating Hubbard. "I brought him down here with me 
and he has got so independent I have got to sell him." 

"What will you take for him f ' 

"Why, he ought to bring me $1,500 quick, but I Avill 
take $1,000 if it can be arranged quietly." 

In less than twenty-four hours they had agreed on 
terms and Hubbard had been sold by his slave. The 
papers were passed and the money paid over. Mack only 
stipulating that the buyer should take his property without 
needless disturbance. When Hubbard was seized, he 
fought like a wildcat ; but he was finally overpowered and 
taken from the fashionable hotel to the jail. Nor could 



SHERRARD CLEMENS GIVES WARNING. 53 

he ffet release until three well-known citizens of Williams- 
burg, fortified with papers of identification from the Vir- 
ginia authorities, made the long trip to New Orleans. 
The trial cost Hubbard a large sum of money and con- 
sumed a great deal of time, not to speak of the wear and 
tear of temper ; but for once in his brutal life he realized 
what it was to be a human chattel. Meantime Mack had 
disappeared and was never traced beyond the wharf 
whence he took passage for the North. It was supposed 
he went to France, where he had lived during his former 
master's student days. 

VAIN WARNING. 

By the failure of the insurrectionary enterprise, 
undertaken in 1861, all this profitable industry and traffic 
was wholly lost to the Old Dominion, and even her stock 
in trade. The cotton States were then looking to the 
reopening of the African slave-trade. Sherrard Clemens, 
in the United States House of Representatives, January 
2, 1861, warned Virginia of the risk she would take of 
losing her domestic trade in negroes by an alliance with 
the Southern Confederacy. "One of the first measures of 
this Confederacy," he said, "would be to reopen the 
African slave-trade so as to reduce the price of negroes. 
1'hey would not then purchase the negroes as they do now, 
paying $1,600 for a good hand here; they would bring 
them at a low price from Africa and then mould them 
into shape by the blessings of Christianity and civiliza- 
tion." 



54 THE EENDING OF VIRGINIA. ' 

THE POWERS OF DARKNESS. 

The greed of Virginia to breed negroes for the cotton 
fields was akin to that fiercer greed under spur of which 
Spain, in her fury for gold, committed such unspeakable 
atrocities upon the simple and innocent peoples in the 
central parts of the American continent. It is another 
illustration, like that unequalled infamy, of the devilish 
capabilities of even enlightened human nature when 
under control of a base motive. "The crime of Spain," 
says Draper, "became her punishment." From the great- 
est of nations she has come do^vn to the weakest. So, too, 
did the crime of Virginia avenge itself on her. For that 
this traffic of hers in human flesh and blood — too often 
their own — should produce degeneracy among Virginians 
is no surprise. As against the Washingtons, the George 
Masons, the Henrys, Madisons and Marshalls of the olden 
time, 1861 had evolved the Wises, the Pryors, the Tylers, 
Letchers, the "Jim" Masons and Floyds, and others akin. 
^N^ature and justice will be avenged. The French Revolu- 
tion was scarcely less the offspring of sexual profligacy in 
official circles than of oppression by the privileged classes. 
The governing class had become debased and were no longer 
fit to rule. So 1861 in Virginia was legitimate heir to 
the forty or fifty years of growing degeneracy and brutal- 
ism leading down to that bloody culmination. That year 
found the old "Mother of Presidents" with moral sense 
blunted, humane sentiments replaced by the truculent 
impulses of the slave-driver and human-stock-breeder. We 
see the savagery of Legree crop out in the violence aroiind 
the Richmond Convention — in the rank conspiracy which 



ON THE DOWN GRADE. 55 

summoned its ruffians to the Capital to inaugurate a reign 
of terror; in the intimidation by Wise when he rises in 
the secret session of the Convention, and, drawing a large 
Virginia horse-pistol from his bosom, lays it before him 
and glares around him at the Union members like some 
homicidal maniac; in his later cruelty to the poor Jew 
merchants at Charleston, whose sole offence was loyalty to 
their government ; in the devilish cruelty of Pate's and 
Jenkins' troopers to Congressman Whaley and his fellow 
prisoners captured at Guyandotte — all detailed in these 
pages. Wise once said with reference to the Virginia 
schemes for colonizing in Liberia : "Africa gave Virginia 
a savage as a slave ; Virginia gives back Africa a citizen 
and a Christian." This appears to be only a part of the 
truth. Emerson says, "you cannot do wrong without suf- 
fering wrong. If you put a chain around the neck of 
a slave, the other end fastens itself around your own. 
* * * For everything that is given something is 
taken." While Mr. Wise was making a citizen and 
Christian of the African savage, the African citizen and 
Christian was making a savage of Mr. Wise. It was 
simply an exchange of characteristics in strict accord 
with Emerson's (or rather God's) law of compensation. 
If slavery had lifted the black as claimed, it had at the 
same time barbarized the Avhite — of which truth where 
shall we find a fitter illustration than Wise himself ? 

The destruction of the Roman empire Dr. Draper 
attributes to the extinguishment of the ethnical element 
of Rome in the flood of barbarism invasion, producing 
"blood degeneration." There was blood degeneration in 
Virginia — but there was worse. The blood degenerates 



56 THE BENDING OF VIRGINIA, 

were sold to the rice, cane and cotton fields. Those who 
sold them were sometimes their brothers, sometimes their 
fathers. The catastrophe there was moral, not ethnical. 
The noble ideals of older Virginia, always recognizing the 
wrong of slavery and looking to its removal, were over- 
whelmed in the demoralization arising from a new greed 
for wealth and power which deemed crime against human 
nature no bar to its objects. iSTever nor anywhere did any 
people coin human flesh and blood into money in a baser 
way. 

It is an inexorable law of the moral world that the 
wages of sin is death ; the cost of crime expiation. Vir- 
ginia in 1861 was but coming to judgment; only prepar- 
ing to reap what she had sown. The Richmond male- 
factors could not realize this, for whom the gods are 
about to destroy they first make mad. "Judgment for an 
evil thing," remarks Carlyle, '4s many times delayed 
some day or two, some century or two ; but it is as sure 
as life, it is as sure as death." 

REJECTED BY THE WEST. 

The testimony in that old convention against slavery, 
and against the inequality of white rights it demanded, 
fell upon dull ears. "]^o man would listen," as Carlyle 
says of another case of like fatuity; "each went his 
thoughtless way, and time and destiny also traveled on." 
None of the reforms demanded by the West were con- 
ceded. The Eastern aristocrats went on in their own 
predestined course and made a constitution so ill-suited to 
Western needs and ideas that on the final vote in the 



CONVENTION OF 1850-51. 57 

Convention every vote from territory now in West Vir- 
ginia was cast against it, except that of Phillip Doddridge, 
who was ill and absent; and when it was submitted to 
the people, it was condemned in the West with correspond- 
ing unanimity. In Brooke County, 371 votes were cast 
against it, not one for it ; in Ohio 3 for and 643 against ; 
in Harrison 8 for and 1,112 against; in Tyler 5 for and 
299 against ; in Preston 121 for and 357 against. Two- 
fifths of the vote in the entire State was against this con- 
stitution; and two-thirds of that adverse vote was in the 

West. 

"twenty years after." 

Twenty years later came another convention and 
another revision. In this twenty years the world had not 
stood still, despite the contrary belief on the part of the 
Richmond political "Jaspers." In this Convention of 
1850-51, the West was again ably represented, with George 
W. Summers, a Whig, in the leadership. He was seconded 
by such men as "Tom" Gaily, of Wheeling, Carlile, Van 
Winkle and James H. Ferguson. Joseph Johnson and 
Gideon D. Camden, of Harrison, and Zachariah Jacob, 
of Wheeling, were in this Convention. 

A MAN OF mystery. 

Mr. Ferguson, a man of remarkable mental power, was 
in the post-bellum period the sphynx of West Virginia. 
He was a native of Montgomery County, Virginia, but 
removed to Cabell County when a youth. He studied law 
on the shoemaker's bench, went to the Legislature, and, 
despite the lack of all artificial advantages, at once took 



•>0 THE KENDIXG OF VIKGINIA. 

foremost rank, Wliile a member of the Legislature, he 
was elected to this Convention. After its adjournment, 
he disappeared for a dozen years, but came back into 
West Virginia about the close of the war, bearing about 
him an unpleasant odor of mystery and suspicion. Gossip 
said he had been with the Mormons, the lieutenant of 
Brigham Young, and that he had been present at the 
Mountain Meadow massacre; other gossip, that he had 
been in the Eebellion ; other again, that he had been liv- 
ing in N"ew York incognito. But he seems to have left 
little trace of himself in that interval of darkness. When 
he came into Cabell County, in 1864, he entered quickly 
into public life ; and so commanding were his abilities that 
there was none to dispute his primacy in the Legislature 
into which he soon found his way, nor at the bar, nor on 
the bench, to which he ascended later. There was a time 
when he could apparently have had the United States 
Senatorship for the asking, but modestly held back. There 
were those who explained his modesty by the theory that 
he shunned the blaze of a too great conspicuity. It was 
he who, in the West Virginia House of Delegates, in 
February, 1865, introduced the bill by which slavery was 
abolished in the State. The Fifteenth Amendment had 
just been ratified and there was no longer any contest 
over the question. The Richmond Convention of 1850-51 
had agreed, after a three-months' debate on suffrage, that 
the white basis should be conceded for the House and the 
mixed retained for the Senate. There was an informal 
understanding — a part of the settlement not put into the 
constitution — that in 1865 the people of Virginia might 
vote on an amendment constituting the Senate also on 



THE CONSTITUTION OF 1850-51. 59 

the white basis. It happened to Mr. Ferguson that in 
that year by his hand should be plucked out the last root 
of the jDestilent j)lant of slavery from trans-Allegheny 
Virginia. 

A HALF LOAF. 

The demands of the West in this Convention were too 
forceful to be longer resisted, and some concessions had 
to be made towards reform and liberalization. Besides 
the white basis for the House, vainly demanded by Dodd- 
ridge twenty years before, the people were permitted to 
elect the Governor — theretofore appointed by the As- 
sembly. It is worth noting that for the first time under 
the new constitution then made the West furnished the 
candidates for Governor. Summers of Kanawha and 
Johnson of Harrison were the champions of the Whig 
and Democratic parties respectively; and Johnson, the 
"runt," was chosen over the intellectual Whig giant. For 
the explanation of such a result, we do not have far to go. 
Mr. Summers had in this Convention made the greatest 
and most creditable speech of his life, showing that slavery 
was not only the foe to progress in the West, but the cause 
of multiplied ills from which all Virginia was suffering. 
The Democratic party in Virginia was the defender of 
slavery, and nowhere more zealous in its service than in 
Western Virginia. 

The mixed basis in the Senate under the new consti- 
tution gave for slaves a representation equal to three-fifths 
of the white unit. Thus five slaves conferred as much 
political power as three white men. 



60 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

In 1860 there were in all Virginia 498,887 slaves, 
of whom 12,771 were in the 48 counties first formed into 
West Virginia. The 486,116 slaves in the east were equal 
in the Senate to 291,669 white people, of whom there 
were then in those 48 western counties 334,921, whose 
political power was thus nearly neutralized by this slave 
representation. 

UNFRIENDLY LEGISLATION. 

Eastern jealousy of the West did not confine itself to 
discrimination in matters of suffrage and representation. 
A well-informed citizen of West Virginia, writing thirty- 
odd years ago, says the expediency of dividing the State 
was discussed as early as 1822. The result of that dis- 
cussion, he says, was that the East took alarm and "the 
seaboard and tide-water districts, in order to make sure- 
of the Valley, extended internal improvements of all 
descriptions into that section, uniting the people com- 
mercially and socially with Richmond ; and after the 
Baltimore & Ohio Railroad had extended a branch to 
Winchester, our Legislature denied further charters ; and 
when Baltimore proposed to extend branches of its road 
throughout our territory at its own expense, the Legis- 
lature refused to grant charters for the purpose, being 
willing neither to improve our country nor to permit any 
one else to do it." 

It is well-known that the granting of a charter for 
the extension of the Baltimore & Ohio road through to 
the Ohio River was long resisted at Richmond as in line 
with the policy of discrimination against the western sec- 
tion, to protect the slave-holding East against an undue 



DISCRIMINATION AGAINST THE B. & O. R. R, 61 

increase of western power and influence — Richmond fear- 
ing also the commercial rivalry of Baltimore. The same 
selfish policy forced the building of the Cleveland & Pitts- 
burg River line on the western bank to a terminus a mile 
away from its objective point and beyond two rivers ; and 
never till we had cut loose from Richmond was a road per- 
mitted to go from Pittsburg to Wheeling by the short route 
on the Virginia side. 

This hostility to railroad facilities for the Xorthwest 
persisted down to the opening of the Rebellion ; and the 
manifestation of it vindicated the wisdom of extending the 
borders of the new State eastward so as to take in the line 
of the Baltimore & Ohio. In the boundary discussion in 
the Constitutional Convention, in December, 1861, Mr. 
Van Winkle remarked that since 1850-51, when the North- 
western Virginia- Railroad was chartered, he had spent a 
part of every winter at Richmond. He said : 

My principal business, besides endeavoring to get some legis- 
lation for our company, was to fight off, in the best way I could, 
the attempts that were made in every session of the Legislature, 
without an exception, to place restrictions on this Baltimore & 
Ohio Railroad. The whole course of legislation towards it has 
been characterized by a spirit — I hardly know how to describe 
it; for it would dignify it to call it by the name of rivalry, com- 
petition or jealousy — of something that could not bear to see 
prosperity of any rival city in another State to which that road 
was contributing. 

Referring to these remarks of Mr. Van Winkle, Mr. 
Hall, of Marion, said : 

I believe my friend (Van Winkle) has not been down at 
Richmond as recently as some of the rest of us. My friend from 
Doddridge (Stuart) and my friend from Monongalia (Willey) 



62 THE KEXDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

could bear testimony with myself to other matters carrying out 
and evincing that same principle. Yes, sir, with clenched teeth 
they cursed themselves there for having been so stupid as to 
allow the Baltimore & Ohio road to be built. "Why," they said, 
"we have gone and given them a charter, and the thing has 
abolitionized the whole country!" Henry A. Wise and others 
were debating the thing; and if they had not had other matters 
that engaged them more directly, they would have urged upon 
that convention the repeal of the charter of that road, would 
have cut it plumb in two. 

Mr. Willey: Mr. Wise and his friends declared that the 
act of secession did repeal that charter. 

Mk. Hall of Marion: Yes, that is a fact. 

Mr. Van Winkle: That they had a right to take posses- 
sion of it. 

Mr. Hall of Marion: Yes; that by the very act of seces- 
sion the charter rights ceased to be of validity; and since that 
they have hauled away the cars and piled up the rails. That is 
"unfriendly legislation," and more too. 

UNEQUAL TAXATION. 

While, as we have seen, the slave was made an enor- 
mous iiolitical factor and his owner allowed to shape the 
entire statiitorv system of the State, the value of the 
chattel evaporated when it came to taxing it. A slave 
worth on the block $1,600 to $1,800 was taxed the same 
a?, $300 value of land. Those under twelve vears old were 
exempt. In the West where chattel property was chiefly 
in live-stock or other farm products, or in manufactured 
goods, these were taxed on their full value. 

Haymond, of Marion, in his two-days' speech in the 
Richmond Convention of 1861, contending for ad valorem 
taxation, showed up this iniquity. Taking the latest 
figures available, he said that in 1859 there were in Vir- 
ginia 239,000 slaves under twelve years old, 272,000 over 



INEQUALITY OF TAXATION. 63 

twelve. The slaves twelve years old or over were taxed 
the same as $300 worth of land, the others were totally 
exempt. He said slave property had trebled in value dur- 
ing' his recollection. Tlie Auditor of Virginia estimated 
the Virginia slaves as being worth over $600 in Georgia. 
The 272,000 slaves over twelve being taxed at $300 each 
less than their value, here was an exemption of $81,600,- 
000, which should have yielded a revenue of $326,000. 
The 239,000 slaves under twelve, totally exempt, Mr. Hay- 
mond valued at $300 each. Here was another exemption 
equal to $71,700,000, which, taxed as other property, 
should have yielded a revenue of $286,000. The trans- 
Allegheny section of the State, he said, paid $693,000 
annual revenue — very little of it on slave property. The 
entire slave property of the State was worth $234,000,000, 
but paid into the treasury only about $326,000. Of that 
property, $1.53,300,000 did not pa}"^ one cent. At the rate 
paid by real estate west of the mountains, four mills, this 
slave property should have paid $937,600. 

As if these inequalities were not enough to fill the 
cup of the white working-people of the West, there was 
laid a tax on wages. Mercantile business was taxed by 
a system of licenses, on the theory that the prosecution 
of trade was a privilege and not an immunity of citizen- 
ship. The earning of the daily bread by the sweat of 
honest brows was another privilege to be taxed, and if 
j)ossible degraded, because it was at war with the system 
controlling State legislation based on the theory that labor 
is disreputable and should be performed only by slaves. 
The man whose only income was his day's wages must give 
up \)'ay\ of it to the State before his family had been fed 



64 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

and clothed, whether there might be a surplus or deficit. 
The State took its exaction first ; the wife and children 
had what might be left. A tax of this kind has in enlight- 
ened lands always been deemed little less than infamous. 
It is the naked knife of Shjlock demanding its pound of 
flesh, for it defies the maxim of finance, everywhere recog- 
nized, that all taxes shall come out of surplus. 

UNFAIR EXPENDITURE. 

To make these tax discriminations the keener, the 
revenues required in such undue proportion from the 
West were lavished in even greater disproportion in the 
East, in the construction of public buildings, railroads, 
canals and other highways. In the Virginia House of 
Delegates at Wheeling, December 21, 1861, in a discus- 
sion on the Kanawha Improvement, it was stated by a 
member from Kanawha that the tolls amounting to $20,- 
000 a year had formerly ''all been devoted to James River 
Improvement." The fact is curious and instructive as a 
sample of the spirit and policy of the Richmond regime 
towards the West. There was an internal improvement 
fund in Virginia yielding $90,000 annual revenue which 
went chiefly to James River and wholly to Eastern ob- 
jects. 

WESTERN LOG-ROLLERS. 

It must be admitted the West was not always blame- 
less. Many of her politicians were pusillanimous repre- 
sentatives of the western constituency. They were mere 
toadies and time-servers, purchasable with very small 
favors. It was largely their fault that the West was thus 



EDUCATIONAL POVERTY, DO 

robbed year after year and despised by the eastern lords 
and masters for submitting to it. If a turnpike was 
secured west of the mountains, it was at the cost of twenty 
times its value voted to some grander improvement in the 
East. 

EDUCATIONAL BARRENNESS. 

There was a State educational fund which as far back 
a? 1831 amounted to over a million and a half and yielded 
$75,000 a year revenue ; but this revenue was devoted 
entirely to eastern institutions of learning, which were 
available even there only to the wealthy. Provision for 
general education for the common people never found a 
place in old Virginia statesmanship, though strongly urged. 
by Jefferson about 1776. It could not; for all light and 
knowledge, except for the limited class of proprietors, 
was incompatible with if not dangerous to slavery. The 
children of the common people were left to browse in the 
"old-field" school and find there what scanty education 
they could. From the earliest colonial times educational 
conditions in Virginia had been peculiar. The structure 
of society there took the exclusive rather than the demo- 
cratic social form. In New England the first impulse was 
to group into neighborhood communities so as to have 
school and church centers. Small land-holdings and social 
intercourse was the tendency and became the rule. The 
movement there was centripetal. In Virginia it was centri- 
fugal. The men who came into that wilderness were not 
Puritans. They were of a different class in England, were 
Episcopalians in religion and considered themselves aris- 
tocrats — many of them mere adventurers, others worthless 

Va.— 6 



(56 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

offshoots of good families. They encountered little hos- 
tility from the Indians ; and as soon as they dared venture 
into the wilderness, reached out for vast areas of the 
teeming soil around them and sought to imitate the soli- 
tude and magnificence of the great English estates, each 
putting miles between himself and his nearest neighbor, 
with no community around him but his slaves and white 
retainers. This created a semi-feudal society in which 
social or educational centers were impossible. 

Such institutions of learning as existed in earlier 
colonial Virginia were not the creation of the colony. 
William and Mary College was endowed only after thirty 
years' effort by a few who wanted an institution to edu- 
cate young men for the ministry of the established church, 
the Episcopalian — especially through the zeal of one man. 
Rev. James Blair, who devoted his life to the work. He 
at last secured a royal grant for two thousand pounds, to 
be paid out of the '^quit rents" of Virginia. To this was 
added private subscriptions, Governor Berkeley being one 
of the subscribers. But it was evidently the religious, not 
the educational, side of the institution which appealed to 
the Governor, for on one occasion when the commissioners 
for foreign plantations asked him for information regard- 
ing education, he replied: "I thank God there are no 
free schools or printing, and I hope we shall not have 
these hundred years, for learning has brought disobedience, 
and heresy, and sects into the world ; and printing has 
divulged them and libels against the best government. 
God keep us from both!" 

The lack of educational advantages in this early Vir- 
ginia was no more a matter of regTct with her rulers in 



SOULS VS. TOBACCO; 67 

England than with her rulers at home. It is related that 
when Mr. Blair went to Attorney General Seymour with 
the royal mandate to issue the charter to William and 
Mary, Seymour demurred. The country was then engaged 
in war and could ill afford to plant a college in Virginia. 
Mr. Blair urged that it was to prepare young men for the 
ministry. Virginia, he said, had souls to save as well as 
their English countrymen. '^Souls!" replied Seymour. 
''Damn your souls! Make tobacco!" 

There is no account of a printing press in Virginia 
earlier than 1681 ; and when Lord Effingham came out to 
be Governor he was instructed by the ministry ''to allow 
no person to use a printing press on any occasion what- 
ever." Erom that time till 1729 no printing was done 
in Virginia ; and from that year until ten years before 
the Declaration of Independence there w^as but one press 
in Virginia, and that one "was thought to be too much 
imder the control of the Governor." 

Religious expression was no freer than intellectual. 
It seems remarkable that under such conditions men in 
Virginia should have made the progress they did in the 
direction of liberal government. When Jefferson came 
upon the stage of action he gave his whole energies to the 
amendment of these conditions. In some of his private 
correspondence he said : "I have sworn upon the altar of 
God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over 
the mind of man." The situation in Virginia before the 
time of Jefferson is thus described by Moses Coit Tyler : 

The units of the community isolated; no schools; no literary 
institutions, high or low; no public libraries; no printing press; 
no intellectual freedom; no religious freedom; the force of 



C8 THE REXDIXG OF VICniXIA. 

society tending to create two great classes — the class of vast 
land owners, haughty, hospitable, indolent, passionate, given to 
field sports and politics, and a class of impoverished white 
plebeians and black serfs. 

Such was the Virginia from which even Jefferson conld 
not wrest a system of free common schools. What institu- 
tions of learning did at length grow up did riot meet the 
crying need of the common people. The wealthy could 
send their sons and daughters abroad to be educated. 
The poor could neither do this nor use the few endowed 
institutions at home. From these conditions the West was 
in later times the greatest sufferer; for its society was 
assuming the more social and concentrative form char- 
acteristic of the free States and felt keenly the lack of 
schools. It had not even colleges for the wealthy; while 
the sturdy boys and girls of the common people had to 
struggle for a meager knowledge of the ''three Rs" in the 
primitive emergency schools as best they could. 

DEBT PILED UP FOR BENEFIT OF THE EAST. 

If the one-sided expenditure by the Commonwealth 
had been limited to its revenues, while grievous it would 
still have been less outrageous than it was. But all this 
while the State was borrowing millions which were being 
expended along the same lines of discrimination ; imtil, 
when Virginia by her plunge into the Insurrection closed 
the account between the two sections, there existed a 
bonded debt currently reported in 1861 at about forty- 
five millions, but really of about thirty-two millions, of 
which West Virginia is accountable to the old for less 
than a millio:: for expenditures west of the Alleghenies. 



VEXATIOUS LAXD TITLES. 69 



RUINOUS LAND SYSTEM. 



One thing that operated to retard settlement and 
growth in Western Virginia was the vexatious land sys- 
tem. For two cents an acre the State treasury sold land 
warrants which could be laid on any unappropriated 
lands. In a country where surveys were so difficult and 
the record of them so obscure as in the greater part of the 
southwest, it is not surprising that in time millions of 
acres became shingled with these warrants two or three 
deep. The courts were filled with controversies over titles. 
Besides, there were large tracts for which patents had been 
issued in colonial days by the sovereigns of Great Britain 
to their favorites over which conflicting claims arose with 
people who had laid warrants on these lands or with squat- 
ters who had taken possession without warrant. In later 
years the courts have had to deal with some cases where 
the squatters were so numerous and determined as to 
require the employment of force to carry out the decrees 
of the court and put the legitimate owners in possession. 
The original design of this system was to create a sinking 
fund to relieve taxes, rather than to encourage the settle- 
ment of the region west of the mountains. Most of the 
warrants went to men who took up the lands and held 
them for speculation, thus rather retarding than promot- 
ing settlement. These holdings were so slightly valued 
down to the time of the Rebellion that holders used every 
shift to evade the petty taxes on them, which on a thou- 
sand acre tract seem to have amounted to scarcely twenty 
dollars in twenty years. To-day these lands are among 
the most valuable in America, covered with valuable hard- 
wood timber, and underlaid with the finest bituminous 



70 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

coal and deeper down with caverns of petroleum — made 
thus valuable bv the development which had its beginning 
in the separation from old Virginia and her paralyzing 
policies. While these pages are being written the news* 
papers bring reports of a sale of less than 250,000 acres 
in the Pocahontas coal region to a trust for $10,000,000. 

THE OPEN VOTE. 

One of the agencies — and no unimportant one — for 
maintaining the domination of the slave aristocracy was 
the system of viva voce voting at popular elections. Under 
its operation all dependent men went to the polls under 
duress. Only those in independent circimistances could 
vote with entire freedom. Nor even they, however placed 
beyond business injury ; for the social code was exacting, 
and an attitude that was deemed unfriendly in politics to 
the dominant slave regime was sufficient ground for social 
ostracism. This open vote was one of the shackles cast off 
in the first constitution of West Virginia. When the bal- 
lot method was adopted in the convention that framed 
that constitution, the "Wheeling Intelligencer made this 
comment : 

Had this been done years ago, we never would have been 
in revolution to-day. A large part of the voters of this State 
by virtue of the viva voce system have been its veriest slaves. 
Thousands of men have voted every year contrary to their con- 
victions in order to make their peace or secure the good will of 
those who had them in some way and in some degree in their 
power. It was called by its adopters a system that preserved 
"the healthful influence of the landlord over the tenant," or in 
other words made the tenant a slave to vote as he was told. 
Such a system was a disgrace to our statute-boolj. It was one 



POLITICAL INTOLERANCE. 71 

of those old aristocratic thumb-screws of Eastern Virginia en- 
grafted by her and preserved by her in our early and later con- 
stitutions to prop up her despotic influence. 

THE WESTERN SERFDOM. 

Under the conditions described, the West never was 
or could be anything but a political cipher and a tributary 
from which large revenues were exacted without corre- 
sponding benefit. Her abject position is shown in the fact 
that in three-quarters of a century the territory west of 
the Blue Ridge had but one United States Senator and 
only one Governor. While the larger part of the Western 
people were of Virginia stock, they had nevertheless at 
last grown to realize that they had some rights entitled 
to respect — that hitherto too much had been required and 
too little given. 'They were Virginian in their traditions 
and did not give up their pride in the historic fame of 
the Commonwealth ; but they saw the Old Dominion had 
become degenerate ; and they had at times been made to 
know that she was intolerant in the matter of personal 
liberty, to which by her bill of rigbts she was so gener- 
ously pledged. A considerable population along the north- 
ern and western borders had leaked in from Pennsylvania 
and Ohio who had little reverence for Virginia traditions 
and no liking for the peculiar institution, which they 
found antagonistic to their interests and self-respect. 

INTOLERANCE OF THE SLAVE REGIME. 

It had become the deliberate policy of those who man- 
aged the politics of slavery to trammel men's speech, lest 
it be unfriendly. How after the tide turned with the insti- 
tution early in the century this intolerance grew with the 



72 THE REINTDING OF VIRGINIA. 

growth ajiid power of the slave cabal — how liberty of the 
press, of speech, even of private reading, suffered prohibi- 
tion and outrage — is too large a part of the country's 
history to need more than passing allusion. Western Vir- 
ginia had become so nearly free soil that her people were 
not often subjected to the intolerance which was so in- 
tolerable in some other parts of his "Sable Majesty's" 
dominions. Yet even there men were sometimes made to 
feel the muzzle through public opinion and social pres- 
sure — sometimes by application of the inquisitorial statute 
which made the printing of any opinions deemed un- 
friendly or disrespectful to H. S. M. lese majeste. In 
1856, when the Republican party had put its first ticket 
into the field, there was a general purpose in the border 
States to stamp out all sympathy with it by application 
of the Southern inquisition. In Wood County, William E. 
Stevenson, afterwards Governor of West Virginia, was 
. indicted for giving circulation to Hinton Rowand Helpers' 
book, "The Impending Crisis," a valuable work of statis- 
tical and political information, written by a citizen of 
North Carolina with a political foresight amounting al- 
most to prophecy. But the prosecutors lacked courage 
to bring the case to trial. In Harrison, William P. Hall 
and Ira Hart were indicted (though never brought to 
trial) under instructions of Judge Gideon Draper Cam- 
den, of the Clarksburg Circuit, assisted by Benjamin Wil- 
son, prosecuting attorney, for giving circulation to the 
New York Tribune. Horace Greeley was included in the 
indictment for publishing the paper. Under the tyran- 
nical statute of Virginia that newspaper was held by this 
honorable court to be "incendiary." It illustrates the 



PKOSLAVEKY KANAWHA. 73 

whirligig of time and its revenges to mention that in 1870 
Mr, Greeley lectured at Clarksburg by invitation of the 
Harrison County Agricultural Society, and it happened 
to me to report and publish his address. 

It is not easy, even for those who lived through it, to 
realize now how abject in States like Virginia was the 
deference to the exactions, social and political, of the 
regime which ruled the South. All men who aspired to 
public station, who already held such places, or who were 
in any wise conspicuous in the public eye, trimmed and 
cringed before the all-pervasive sentiment of loyalty to 
slavery. It was as obnoxious and as dangerous to dis- 
parage it as it is in Russia to express any lack of respect 
for the Czar. Politicians accepted the attitude of veiled 
hostility to the Federal government required by this fealty 
to "Southern Institutions." They paraded on all occa- 
sions their attachment to their State ; there was every- 
where the narrowest and rankest provincialism. 

SOUTHWEST TRUE TO RICHMOND. 

At the opening of 1861, the southern section of what 
is now West Virginia was more in sympathy with the old 
regime in the East than with the new ideas fermenting in 
the Northwest. It is true, as claimed by Carlile in the 
August convention at Wheeling when that body was con- 
sidering the question of division, that in a political sense 
there was no West except the N^orthwest. "When gentle- 
men speak of the West," said Mr. Carlile, "they think of 
it as defined by a natural line. In a political sense there 
is no West, and never has been, save the Northwest. That 
is the fact as the records and journals for the last half 



1 4: THE RENDI]^G OF VIRGINIA. 

eenturv will justify." In the region drained by the Great 
KanaAvha, slaves were numerous and the sympathy with 
the system stronger than their number warranted. In the 
Wheeling May convention, there was not a delegate from 
any county south of Mason; in the June convention, 
none at the opening from Kanawha or Putnam. A dele- 
gate presented himself from Cabell, but could not^or 
would not — take the oath of loyalty and went away. He 
had been elected to the Legislature, but preferred Kich- 
mond to Wheeling and soon joined the rebellious body 
on the James. In the convention that framed the consti- 
tution for the new State, a Kanawha delegate made per- 
sistent efforts to rip up the boundary prescribed by the 
August ordinance in a w^ay which if it had been successful 
must have defeated the division entirely. The feeling 
among the dominant class in that region at that time is 
indicated by a statement made by Robert Hagar in the 
constitutional convention, that he was personally ac- 
quainted with all the owners of slaves in Boone, Logan 
and Wyoming, and that of the whole number only one 
(John McCook) was a Union man. What was true in 
those counties was true in others — indeed, throughout 
the State. ^N^apoleon said scratch a Russian and you would 
find a Tartar undern-eath. At that period scratch a slave- 
holder anywhere ii: Virginia and you would find a seces- 
sionist — so unerring is the instinct of self-interest. 

THE LAST POUND. 

Motley speaks of the Netherlands as a country "dis- 
inherited by nature of its rights," where "a race engaged 
for generations in stubborn conflict with the angry ele- 



THE DOOR OF DELIVERANCE. 75 

ments imconsciouslj educating itself for its greater strug- 
gle with the still more savage despotism of man." West- 
ern Virginia was "disinherited," though not by nature; 
but her "peasantry" had all this while been growing up to 
the stature when they should be prepared to demand their 
deserts, and that divinity that shapes the ends of the world 
was providing them a recompense. 

Old Virginia by a well-matured, consistent and long- 
continued course of discrimination and wrong, had created 
the conditions for revolt west of the mountains. It 
needed only some final turn of the screw — some special 
provocation and outrage — to give the signal. This came 
in 1861 in such measure as to sweep away the last feeling 
of hesitation. The people who had been resisting aggres- 
sion and oppression for half a century were not now to 
be turned over without their consent, without notice even, 
by a league made without authority and in secret, to the 
Cotton State Confederacy. There was neither time nor 
opportunity for protest, if this had availed. The crisis 
came like a thunder-clap ; and with it the opportunity 
which had waited decades for the hour to strike. 

Dodge in the opening of his "West Virginia" indulges 
this remark : 

When statesmen degenerate into politicians and the princi- 
ple of states'-rights is prostitutea to the uses of treason, it is 
eminently fit and in accordance with the law of compensation 
that the madness of the present hour should open to patriotism 
a door of escape from inequality and organized oppression to 
future industrial advancement, political independence and 
superior civilization. 



CHAPTEK III. 

SLAVERY THE GERM OF REBELLION— SEED, GROWTH, 

FLOWER. 

INVENTING A REVOLUTION. 

Eli Whitney's cotton-gin opened before Southern poli- 
ticians a vista of wealth and empire through the produc- 
tion of cotton for the markets of the world. These men 
already had a system of political objects and ethics dis- 
tinct and variant from those held in the North; and the 
promotion of their aims now took on the character of a 
moral if not political conspiracy. 

SLAVERY TRANSFORMED. 

For a time after the adoption of the Constitution, 
vngue hopes of a gradual removal of slavery were enter- 
tained even in some of the Southern States. Slavery 
was not profitable, a fact that quickened the consciences of 
masters and inclined them to emancipate. This was the 
period when eminent Virginians were indulging their 
homilies over the wickedness of slavery. Virginia was 

76 



EARLY SLAVERY IN VIRGINLA.. 77 

overloaded with Africans beyond all other colonies. The 
demand for them in the culture of tobacco had enabled the 
traders to dispose of their dusky cargoes there till the Old 
Dominion was more than filled to repletion. Outside of 
tobacco there was no culture that could make this raw 
labor profitable. When by this single crop the soil had 
become exhausted, the jDroblem had increased in difficulty. 

The first African slaves were brought into Virginia 
by a Dutch vessel and landed at Jamestown in 1619 — the 
year before the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth. At the 
opening of the Revolution, it was estimated, about 300,- 
000 slaves had been imported into the American colonies. 
In 1791, Virginia had about 295,000 slaves and 12,000 
free negroes. In 177-4 the Continental Congress resolved 
to stop the importation, but in the formation of the Con- 
stitution, on demand of the slave interest and in order to 
make it possible to secure a Constitution and Union at all, 
Congress was forbidden to interdict the African trade 
until 1808, when it was stopped. Georgia had prohibited 
it ten years before ; and in 1820 it was by act of Congress 
made piracy. At the opening of the Rebellion there were 
nearly four million African slaves in the Southern States. 

Emancipation and colonization were agitated in Vir- 
ginia for many years, and some private experiments were 
tried by eminent men. Washington, John Randolph and 
his brother Richard were among those who freed their 
slaves by will. John Randolph had 386 at the time of his 
death, and he left a fund of $30,000 to colonize them in 
Ohio. The colony was a failure, and the negroes scattered 
far and wide. 



(O THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

But before the sentiment in favor of emancipation in 
Virginia had become strong enough to prompt action by 
the State, the invention of the cotton-gin (in 1793) ar- 
rested the tide and turned it back with a force that grew 
to be irresistible. Even Jefferson could make no head- 
way against it. The relation of slavery to the country was 
quickly reversed. Cotton at once took on the airs and 
prerogatives of royalty. 

CROWNING KING COTTON. 

The cotton industry in- Europe which furnished a 
market for the American staple, and was destined to work 
such momentous results in this country, had its origin 
in the Saracen occupation of the Spanish peninsula, where 
cotton manufacture by the Moors began about A. D. 930, 
and whence it spread to Venice and into other parts of 
Europe. The first exportation from the United States 
was in 1784, in very small quantity. The obstacle to the 
preparation of the staple for the market was in the diffi- 
culty of removing the seed. A man could seed only one 
pound of cotton in a day. A cotton-gin multiplied this 
several hundred-fold. This multiplication of facility was 
responsible for tremendous consequences. The production 
and export rapidly increased from twenty millions in 
value (in 1801) to one hundred and fifty millions per 
year. In 1856, it was estimated the cotton produced in 
the United States was seven-eighths of the entire product 
of the world. As the business was limited only by the 
ability to j)roduce and prepare the staple for the market, 



EXPANSION NECESSARY TO SLAVERY. 79 

the demand for labor in the cotton fields grew in almost 
geometrical ratio, the price of the human commodity rose 
rapidly, and the production was tremendously stimulated. 

ROOM FOR ROYALTY. 

Slave propagandism quickly took on a new character. 
Its partisans drew together by natural gravitation for the 
conservation of the enormous interests suddenly developed. 
The first want after this was more territory — room for 
expansion. ''The condition of existence for a slaveocracy 
competing wath free labor," remarks Von Hoist, "is bound- 
less expansion." In the ''Peace Conference" of 1861, this 
demand found expression through a delegate from Korth 
Carolina. "You will never," he said, "get back the se- 
ceded States without you give them some hope of the 
acquisition of future territory. They know that when 
slavery is gathered into a cul de sac and surrounded by 
the wall of the free States, it is destroyed. Slavery must 
have expansion. It must expand by the acquisition of 
territory which we do not own. The seceded States will 
never come back to a government which gives no chance 
for the expansion of their principal institution." The 
reason for this need of continual expansion is stated in a 
few w^ords by one who wrote from long experience of plan- 
tation life : 

The Southerners are for the most part men whose only 
wealth is in their land and laborers. A large force of slaves is 
their most profitable investment. The planters are men of large 
estates but restricted means; many of them are deeply in debt 
and there are few who do not depend from year to year for their 
subsistence on the harvest of their fields and the chances of 



80 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

the cotton and rice crops of each season. This makes it of vital 
importance to them to command an unrestricted extent of terri- 
tory. The man who can move a "gang" of able-bodied negroes 
to a tract of virgin soil is sure of an immense return of wealth; 
as sure as that he who is circumscribed in this respect and 
limited to the cultivation of certain lands with cotton or tobacco 
by slaves will in the course of a few years see his estate grad- 
ually exhausted and unproductive, refusing its increase, while 
its black population, propagating and multiplying, will compel 
him eventually under penalty of starvation to make them his 
crop and substitute, as the Virginians have been constrained to 
do, a traffic in human cattle for the cultivation of vegetable 
harvests. 

BARREN VICTORIES. 

The acquisition of Louisiana, the annexation of Texas, 
the cession of large territory bj Mexico, were victories for 
the slavery expansionists ; yet the conquest of Mexico a 
fruitless one. The "Wilmot Proviso" offered in 1846 by 
a Pennsylvania Democrat, was intended to preserve from 
the blight of slavery territory that might be wrenched 
from Mexico. It provided that slavery should not be ad- 
mitted to territory acquired by treaty. It was not 
adopted, but despite the consummation foreseen by Wil- 
mot, the result was reached without it. The "divinity that 
shapes our ends" was working to defeat the schemes that 
lay behind the onslaught upon Mexico. California was 
admitted as a free State under Clay's compromise of 
1850; and of the rest of the territory acquired with it, 
none ever became the home of the blighting institution. 
Slavery had a nominal existence for a time in IsTew Mex- 
ico under a territorial statute passed in 1859. The Legis- 
lature was authorized to enact laws and report them to 



EXPANSION WHICH DID NOT EXPAND. 81 

Congress. If Congress should disapprove, the enactment 
became void. The act establishing slavery in the Territory 
was approved in the House but not acted on in the Senate. 
Slavery meanwhile was legalized there but did not take 
root. In 1860 there were only sixty slaves in the Territory. 
Acquired though new domain might be through the 
machinations of the oligarchy, the control remained in 
Congress. As the free States grew in population and rep- 
resentation in Congress and the slave States lagged in 
the race, the possession of the Territories by their evil in- 
stitution receded farther and farther from the South ; and 
the prospect that any of them could be shaped into slave- 
States by action of Congress became every year more re- 
mote. Hence it was that while the South appeared to be 
winning at all points, Southern statesmen like Calhoun 
realized the actual situation. It was like one walking on 
a way moving in the opposing direction. His progress is 
overcome by the trend beneath his feet — by a force greater 
than his own. The civilization of the world — especially 
the civilization of the American Republic — was moving in 
a direction opposed to the progress of the Southern negro- 
breeding, cotton-raising enterprise, which was being swept 
along to the crisis its aggressions must at length provoke, 
to ultimate overthrow. 

A BOOMERANG. 

It is instructive to note how the Southern hunger for 
new territory in that earlier period turned later to posi- 
tive loathing. It made all the difference whose ox was be- 
ing gored — which system of society was to be profited by 

Va.-6 



82 THE RENDING OF VIEGINIA. 

such acquisitions. When it was found that through the 
greater energy of free society the national domain was be- 
ing fashioned into free States, the slavery partisans took 
the other cue; and in their ultimatum in the spring of 
1861, one of their demands was that no more territory 
should be acquired except with consent of four-fifths of 
the Senate, where they held what they supposed a secure 
control. Note the poignancy of this disappointment in a 
subsequent quotation from Calhoun demanding "equal 
rights in the acquired territories" — acquired on demand of 
the South to make new fields for slavery. 

CATALINE CALHOUN. 

After Calhoun had been silenced by Jackson as to 
nullification on the tariff issue, this irreconcilable enemy 
of the Federal Union sought another issue and found it 
in slavery, then already assuming an aggressive and 
formidable attitude. President Jackson himself perceived 
the purpose of his arch enemy; and, writing in 1833 to A. 
J. Crawford concerning the overthrow of nullification, 
he remarked that "the next pretext will be the negro or 
slavery question." Benton in his "Thirty Years" notes 
that the regular inauguration of the slavery agitation 
dates from 1835. Calhoun, when he went home from 
Washington in the spring of that ycr, told his friends 
the South could never be united against the North on the 
tariff question ; that the sugar interest in Louisiana would 
keep her out ; and that the basis of Southern Union must 
be shifted to the slavery question. The first outgrowth of 
this new purpose was the movement in the South which 



REOPEIS^IA'G OLD SORES. 83 

sent the Bowies, Houston, Crockett, Fannin, Travis and 
oilier Southern leaders, into Texas to organize revolution 
and get possession of that vast domain ; which resulted in 
the independence of Texas, its subsequent annexation to 
the United States, the resulting war with Mexico and 
treaty cession of territory. 

FOLLOWING THE FLAG. 

The acquisition of vast possessions w^ith Texas and 
from Mexico was followed by an acute renewal of the 
agitation which had resulted in the Missouri Compromise 
near thirty years before — the struggle for possession of 
the Louisiana Purchase by slavery and the final agreement 
to divide it between the two opposing systems ; touching 
which controvery Jefferson had then written from his re- 
tirement that ''from the battle of Bunker Hill to the 
Treaty of Paris, we never had so immense a question." 
In this renewed agitation, the South made another dis- 
tinct advance in its tactics of aggression. Calhoun 
claimed, in the phrase of this latter day, that "the Consti- 
tution followed the flag;" that because the Constitution 
tolerated slavery in the States, the institution was carried 
by it likewise into the Territories. It was argued that 
slaves were recognized in the Constitution as property and 
that the people in the Territories suffered discrimination 
and inequality in being denied the enjoyment of that 
species of property. Being asked if the Union "could be 
saved," Mr. Calhoun replied that it could if the N^orth 
would concede "an equal right in the acquired territory" 
— meaning the right to establish slavery there — "do her 



84 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

dutj in regard to the fugitive-slave law and cease the agi- 
tation of the slave question." Already there was a large 
body of people in the Northern States who doubted 
whether the Union under such conditions were worth sav- 
ing. This new doctrine was the one which had so ripened 
■by 1861 that it was then offered on all hands as th ; ulti- 
matum of the South and the alternative of war. The com- 
promise of 1820, while not then distinctly repealed, was 
swept aside in the torrent of this new demand. 

CROP REAPED BY ANOTHER. 

The admission of California as a free State, while 
not a repeal of the Missouri Compromise, went over its 
head. Under the Mexican law, California was free terri- 
tory. Under the Southern claim, the Constitution would 
have carried slavery into it. Under the Missouri agree- 
ment, part would have been free and part slave. The 
Wilmot Proviso was designed to assure its freedom, but 
that measure failed. The question was decided directly 
by Congress and the State made free by the act of admis- 
sion. This was the service of one more notice on the South 
that though they might acquire territory they could not 
fasten on it the institution which enlisted all their politi- 
cal energies. 

MISSOURI COMPACT BROKEN. 

The Kansas-]^ebraska act was an actual repeal of the 
Missouri Compromise, for it made a new and different rule 
for dealing with Territories. The inhabitants were left 
to say when they framed their organic law whether it 



THE SETTLEMENT OF 1850. 85 

should be slave or free. This left the question to be fought 
over every time a State was to be organized. The civil 
war in Kansas showed how dangerous this was to the peace 
of the country. It was cumulative of inflammable an- 
tagonisms, and made war inevitable. This was Douglas' 
bid for the favor of the South in his effort to reach the 
Presidency. But the result in Kansas showed the South 
what "squatter sovereignty" would be worth to them. 
Douglas did not gain the favor of the South, while he lost 
that of the North. It showed there was no longer any 
middle ground ; no longer any place in the controversy for 
mere trimmers and expediency politicians. 

clay's compkomise. 

Calhoiin died in the midst of the controversy, the last 
of March, 1850. Clay came forward again as a pacific- 
ator, with a plan covering five conditions. One was the 
admission of California as a* free State; another, terri- 
torial government for Utah and New Mexico ; settlement 
of the Texas boundary ; perpetuation of slavery in the Dis- 
trict of Columbia ; the enactment of the fugitive slave law. 
Tliese were agreed to the following September, and the 
argument of force postponed another ten years. Jeff. 
Davis had demanded the extension of the Missouri Com- 
promise line through to the .Pacific, giving the territory 
south of it to slavery. Clay said no earthly power could 
induce him to carry slavery into any new territory. 



86 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

DRED SCOTT DICTUM. 

Taney's ruling six years later in the Dred Scott case 
was that the Constitution followed the flag and, ex pro- 
prio vigore, carried slavery with it. He gave to the Con- 
stitution the interpretation demanded by the South, and 
made it even broader than Calhoun's most audacious 
thought had ventured to formulate. The pronouncement 
was in effect that the negro was property and could not be 
a citizen ; that being property, he could be carried and 
must be proti?cted wherever other property might be ; that 
the Missouri Compromise, forbidding slavery in territory 
north of a given line, was unconstitutional and that Con- 
gress had no right to prohibit slavery in any Territory; 
the effect of this being also that the Jeffersonian prohibi- 
tion for the jSTorthwest was void. 

This would have been a Waterloo for free institutions 
in the United States if Taney's dictum could have been 
given the force of law ; but in popular governments there 
is a natural law founded on justice and common sense 
which all the ingenuity of lawj^rs and casuists cannot 
pervert. The people in the Northern States were not 
ready to let the great republican experiment on this con- 
tinent be defeated by a political extra-judicial dictum, 
even though it came from the highest tribunal. Public 
opinion in the matter of slavery aggression had reached 
the point where this decision became mere brutem fulmen. 
It only hastened the impending crisis by making clearer 
the purpose of the South. 



SLAVEEY NOT AUTOMOBILE. 87 

KESTORATION OF MISSOURI COMPROMISE. 

The violence done by this decision was corrected, so far 
as it could be, by act of Congress approved by President 
Lincoln, July 19, 1862, restoring the Missouri Compro- 
mise, entitled ''An Act to secure Freedom to all persons 
within the Territories of the United States." This was 
the first step towards the nationalization of freedom. 
Others were: the passage of an act three days before this 
abolishing slavery in the District of Columbia with com- 
pensation to owners; the act of July 17, 1862, freeing 
slaves of rebels coming into the army lines ; and the sweep- 
ing emancipation declared by the President September 
23, 1862, taking effect January 1, 1863. The final ex- 
tinguisher to Calhounism and Taneyism was the XlVtli 
Amendment, declaring that a negro is a citizen, not 
property. 

Webster's sledge hammer. 

Reply to Calhoun's demand for the constitutional ex- 
tension of slavery into the Territories, ex proprio vigore, 
was made by Mr. Webstei', who reminded the country that 
the Constitution was made for the States, not the Terri- 
tories ; that it was not operative even in the States without 
legislation by Congress to enforce it ; that the Territories 
were by the terms of the Constitution absolutely subject 
to the control of Congress. It was in the exercise of this 
control, let us note, up to that time unquestioned, that 
Congress had, on the motion of such Virginians as Thomas 
Jefferson and James Madison, long before dedicated the 
N"orthwest Territory to free institutions, that condition be- 
ing held normal and national, while slavery was recognized 



88 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

as abnormal and local, existing nowhere except bv force 
of positive law — nowhere bj inference or presumption; 
that, as one writer has stated it, "the Union should be the 
nursery of freedom and not a breeding-place for slavery." 

AGITATION TWO-EDGED. 

Calhoun had argued that the agitation against slavery 
was growing more threatening and vhe influence of the 
institution relatively weakening, and that if these ten- 
dencies were not checked, the South would be driven to 
choose between abolition and secession. He forgot it was 
he who had started this agitation in 1835, in behalf of 
slavery, as an entering wedge towards disunion. When 
the wind veered and the agitation began to blow from the 
opposite quarter, it became "displeasing to South Caro- 
lina," as he had said the tariff was in 1832. His endeavor 
to put slavery in the position of the party aggrieved was 
ingenious; and his political executors in 1861 were care- 
ful to follow this lead when, through the Peace Conference 
and the Virginia convention, they put before the country 
their presentment of the case of slavery : how it was being 
cruell}^ confined to a limited domain and prevented from 
spreading its benign presence over the Territories and in 
other respects from becoming national ! 

NO INTERFERENCE. 

The pretense that the North wished to interfere with 
any existing right of slavery was baseless. The firmest 
foe it had was Sumner, and he in 1852 said: "Slavery 



THE NEW ATTITUDE OF THE SOUTH. 89 

where we are parties to it — where we are responsible for 
it — everywhere within our jurisdiction — must be opposed 
by every instrument of the political power. It is a mis- 
take to charge that we seek to interfere through Congress 
with slavery in the States. Our political aims as well as 
our political duties are co-extensive only with our political 
responsibilities." 

A LONG-DISTANCE VIEW OF SLAVERY. 

A view of the pretensions of slavery different from the 
one held by its partisans and apologists in this country was 
expressed by the London Times in January, 1861: 

For the last ten or twelve years Slavery has altered her 
tactics, and from a defensive has become an aggressive power. 
Every compromise which the moderation of former times had 
erected to stem the course of this monster evil has been swept 
away, and that not by the encroachment of the North but by 
the aggressive ambition of the South. With a majority in Con- 
gress and in the Supreme Court of the United States, the ad- 
vocates of slavery have entered upon a career the object of which 
would seem to be to make their favorite institution coterminous 
with the limits of the Republic. With a majority in both houses 
of Congress and in the Supreme Court, the South cannot sub- 
mit to a President who is not their devoted servant. Unless 
every power in the Constitution is to be strained in order to 
permit the progress of slavery, they will not remain in the 
Union. 

This then is the result of the history of slavery. It began 
as a tolerated, it ends as an aggressive institution; and if it 
now threatens to dissolve the Union, it is not because it has any- 
thing to fear for that which it possesses already but because it 
has received a check to its hopes of future acquisition. 



90 THE BENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

WAITING FOR THE BORDER STATES. 

The Cotton-State politicans were themselves ready to 
try conclusions with the sword; but to make their 'tight 
successful they needed the co-operation of the "Border 
States." It was in deference to these that the conditions 
on wdiich they would submit to remain in the Union under 
a Republican President were put forth ; and Virginia, as 
the most potent of the border States, was made the 
medium for giving the ultimatum to the country. It was 
she who called the Peace Conference; and that failing, 
supplemented its demands by the same conditions em- 
bodied in the manifesto of her Convention. Virginia was, 
indeed, the pivotal State. It was the message Richmond 
sent to Charleston by Pryor which fired that first gun at 
Sumter which woke reverberations around the world — and 
it was by a Virginia hand the match to that first gun was 
applied. 

THE PEACE CONFERENCE. 

The "Peace Conference" which met in Washington, 
February 4, 1861, was the result of resolutions passed by 
the Virginia Assembly, January 19th. The Virginia 
members of the Conference were : Ex-President John Ty- 
ler, William C. Rives, John W. Brockenbrough, George 
W. Summers and James A. Seddon. Summers was the 
only one from the western part of the State. The other 
States which sent delegations were: Rhode Island, New 
Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, New Hampshire, Vermont, 
Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Ohio, North Carolina, Indi- 
ana, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Massachusetts, Mis- 
souri, New York, Maine, Iowa and Kansas. The Vir- 
ginia delegates urged the proposition known as the 



PEACE CO:!^rERENCE BRIEF. 91 

"Crittenden Resolutions," with some modifications. This 
so-called "Crittenden Compromise" was industriously 
pushed in the border States as an auxiliary of the "no 
coercion" idea. Concerning the real authorship of these 
resolutions and hence their real significance, a correspon- 
dent of the New York Herald, writing from Alexandria, 
Kentucky, at that period, said : "I state now to you from 
the best personal authority what is generally known here, 
that the Crittenden amendment, so called, was drawn by 
Mr. Breckenridge and M. C. Johnson, Esq., of this city, 
prior to the departure of the former for Washington, and 
by him taken on and entrusted to Mr. Crittenden. This- 
you may rely on as authentic beyond a question." 

The entire programme had been laid out far in ad- 
vance. The labors of the Conference — heralded to the 
country for weeks by daily telegrams — ended in a fore- 
gone demand for every point in the slavery brief. The 
purpose of the Conference, as set forth in the Virginia 
call, was "to afford the slave-holding States adequate 
guarantees for the security of their rights." The Commis- 
sioners agreed in demanding that the territories South of 
36:30 should be devoted absolutely to slavery; never any 
interference there against it by either territorial or Con- 
gressional legislation. It was to be even forbidden to the 
United States to acquire any more territory which could 
by possibility grow into free States — that is, any treaty 
for it must be ratified by four-fifths of all the members 
of the Senate. Then it was to be provided that neither 
the Constitution nor any amendment to it should ever be 
construed to give Congress power to regulate, control or 
abolish slavery within the District of Columbia without 



b 



92 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

consent of Maryland and Virginia, without consent of 
the owners, nor without compensation to them. The Dis- 
trict was to be made definitely slave territory. To still 
further emphasize the national character to be given to the 
institution, it was provided that there should never be any 
prohibition of slavery in places in slave States belonging 
to the United States, such as forts, arsenals or other na- 
tional property. The execution of the fugitive-slave law 
was to be made more rigorous ; and where the marshals 
in the free States might be unable to execute it by reason 
of the popular hostility, compensation for slaves lost was 
to be made by the United States. 

THE VIRGINIA FORESHADOWING. 

There is a striking likeness between these demands and 
those foreshadowed by Governor Letcher, of Virginia, in 
his message to the Assembly, by whom the Conference was 
called, and likewise in the propositions brought out in the 
Virginia convention by its committee on Federal relations; 
which were debated at length for the double purpose of 
inoculating the Convention and the border States with 
their virus and of occupying the time while the conspiracy 
was getting ready for action. The committee named the 
additional condition that no person of the African race 
should ever be a voter or office-holder. 

PLAY AND PROMPTER. 

It is apparent this "peace" conference was only play- 
ing what would have been a farce if it had not had such 
deadly tragedy behind it. It was but the spokesman of a 
prompter behind the scenes giving public expression to 
demands long before carefully formulated. If the shade 



PLAYING TO THE BORDER STATES. 93 

of Calhoun had inspired these, he could not have asked 
for more or worded them with more devilish plausibility. 
The demand was, in a word, to make slavery national and 
freedom local and subordinate. The government was to be 
the mere creature and convenience of the malign institu- 
tion, with free society under the ban, exposed to continual 
punishment, humiliation and shame ; and every day was 
to enact, under the American flag, the "tragedy," as Emer- 
son calls it, of the "ch.^apness of man." 

NORTH IS RESOLUTE. 

The time had been when the people of the North, for 
the sake of peace, from considerations of business, were 
willing to accept large doses of abasement before the men- 
ace of the truculent Southerners, That was past. They 
recalled the compromises of ten and thirty years before 
ruthlessly broken in the interest of slavery. They would 
humiliate themselves no more. They looked the danger 
calmly in the face and with bodeful quiet but rising in- 
digiiation waited for the overt act. When Sumner was 
badgered in the Senate in 1854: for his frank defiance of 
the fugitive-slave law, his reply was, in the words of the 
Prophet : "Is thy servant a dog, that he should do this 
thing ?" Such was now the unuttered answer of the people 
in the free States to the ultimatum put forward by the 
slavery conspirators. 

PLAYING TO BORDER-STATE GALLERIES. 

Yet all this tragic farce over "peace" propositions was 
but a play to the galleries of the border States. The con- 
spirators knew how their demands would be met in the 



^4 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

free States, and they had calculated that the rejection of 
their terms would throw Virginia, and thej believed other 
of the border States, into the arms of their rebellion ; when 
they would need only to raise the flag of an independent 
South, whose cotton scepter should bring the whole com- 
mercial world, including hated iSTew England, to their feet. 

NOTHING BUT SEPARATtQN. 

Judge Summers, one of the most eminent of the Peace 
Commissioners, declared in his speech at Wheeling, in 
1863, that on the part of the Southern men in that Com- 
mission separation was a foregone conclusion. "I saw 
enough," he said, "during the brief stay in Washington, 
while the Peace Conference was in session, to convince me 
that those Southern leaders would be satisfied with no 
amendment to the Constitution, no guaranty that could 
be given. Some of them, indeed, said before the war com- 
menced — before the secession of Virginia : 'You may give 
me a sheet of white paper and let me write it out myself, 
and I will not agree to it.' Nothing but separation would 
satisfy them." 

Edward McPherson, in the preface of his Political 
History of the Rebellion, remarks : "It is difficult for a 
candid person to escape the conviction that adjustment was 
hopeless — revolution being the predetermined purpose of 
the reckless men who had obtained control of the State 
machinery of most of the slave-holding States." 

DISUNION PERDUE. 

A definite purpose in the South to separate from the 
I^orth had long been entertained by leading men. The 



EARLY AGITATION FOR DISUNION. 95 

American system, as called by Clay, for the protection of 
domestic industries against foreign, was hateful to the 
South, whose dependence on coarse agricultural staples, 
employing only the rudest labor, did not require and was 
supposed to be prejudiced by such a system. The con- 
ception that the South might become the home of great 
manufacturing industries had not entered the thought of 
Southern statesmanship, which was blinded to everything 
greater or better by its devotion to the slave system of 
labor applied to the production of staples from the soil. 

The first threat of disunion ever made was by Pierce 
Butler, of South Carolina, in the first Congress, in 1789. 
He declared it was ''as sure as God is in the firmament." 
Kichard Henrv Lee, grandfather of Gen. Eobert E. Lee, 
wrote in 1790: "When we (the South) attain our natural 
degree of population, I flatter myself that we shall have 
the power to do ourselves justice with dissolving the bond 
which binds' us together." Hon. Xathan Appleton, mem- 
ber of Congress in 1832-33, wrote afterwards that when 
in Congress he made up his mind "that Calhoun, Hayne, 
McDuffie and others were desirous of a separation of the 
slave States into a separate confederacy as more favorable 
to the security of slave property." 

A STORY BY FRANK THOMAS. 

Some South Carolinians attempted a demonstration at 
Washington about 1835. Ex-Governor Francis Thomas, 
of Maryland, told about it in a speech at Baltimore, in 
October, 1861. The Southern Congressmen held a meet- 
ing one morning in a committee-room after the hour for 
assembling ; and missing them from their seats and being 



96 THE BENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

asked why he was not in attendance on the "Southern 
caucus," Mr. Thomas, who had not been invited, went to 
the committee-room and "found that little cock-sparrow, 
Pickens, of South Carolina, addressing the meeting and 
strutting about like a rooster around a barn-yard, discuss- 
ing the following resolution : 

Resolved, That no member of Congress representing a South- 
ern constituency shall again take his seat until a resolution is 
passed satisfactory to the South on the subject of slavery. 

"I determined at once," said Thomas, "to kill the trea- 
sonable plot, hatched by John C. Calhoun, the Cataline of 
America, by asking questions." He obtained permission 
to take part in the discussion, and asked what they pro- 
posed to do next, with a lot of other inconvenient questions 
which none could answer. He finally moved an adjourn- 
ment of the caucus sine die, and being seconded by Craig, 
of Virginia, the motion carried. The caucus had been 
proposed by Rhett, of South Carolina. An anti-slavery 
speech by Mr. Slade, of Vermont, had been the immediate 
provocative. 

About 1850 a paper called "The Southern Press" was 
started in Washing-ton, to present the advantages of Dis- 
union and advocate the organization of a Southern Con- 
federacy to be called the "United States of the South." 

VIRGINIA TESTIMONY. 

The writer of the "Sketch," in Vol. I, Hagans' West 
Va. Reports, intimates that the Macchiavellian hand was 
at work in Virginia as far back as the shaping of the Con- 
stitution of 1850-51 ; and the feature of that instrument 



VIRGINIA DISUNIONISTS. 97 

permitting conventions to be called without authority of 
a po])nlar vote was the work of men who had sinister pur- 
poses remotely in vicAV — a part of ''that vast combination," 
the writer calls it, ''of well-laid plans which had been 
maturing for thirty years." 

Samuel McDowell Moore, a Union inember of the 
Richmond Convention of 1861 from Rockbridge County, 
made a speech in the Convention in which he produced the 
documents of the fire-eaters for the twenty years preceding- 
showing that the disunion movement had been secretly 
cherished and fulminated all that time and even longer. 
Mr. Moore had been in the Convention of 1829-30. He 
spoke by the card, and his remarks produced intense ex- 
asperation among the conspirators. The mob in the streets 
made all preparations to burn him in effigy, and only by a 
trick were prevented. Sherrard Clemens was to have a 
similar compliment at the same time; but O. Jennings 
Wise, who had crippled Clemens in a duel, felt that in 
view of his own avowed part with the conspirators his 
honor was involved in preventing this insult to his victim. 
He made a speech to the crowd to dissuade them, and while 
he held their attention the effigies were spirited away. 

William T. Joynes, a native Virginian resident at 
Petersburg, in testifying before the Joint Committee on 
Reconstruction, in February, 1866, said: 

Originally the number of secessionists in the State was very- 
small. The first time I ever heard any man say that he desired 
the dissolution of the Union was during the session of the 
Democratic convention at Petersburg which nominated Mr. 
Letcher in 1859. I confess I was very much shocked at it, and 
I said to the gentleman: "Is it possible?" And he said, with 

Va.-7 



98 THE KENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

some vehemence "Yes," that he wished "the Union might go to 
flinders before to-morrow morning." The next time, so far as I 
recollect, that I heard the declaration was from old Mr. Ruffin, 
which was some time in 1860. He killed himself after the sur- 
render of General Lee. Said I: "Mr. Ruffin, are you in the habit 
of expressing opinions of that kind?" "I have been in that 
habit," said he. "for ten years." 

It will be recalled that it was Mr. Euffin, old and 
white-haired, who touched the match to the opening gun 
fired at Sumter in the dawn of that fateful April 12, 1861. 

MENE TEKEL UPHAESIN. 

But this definite purpose to separate from the North 
was always in abeyance while the South was in control of 
the national administration, and so long as they felt con- 
fident of their ability to maintain their domination. They 
could always depend on a large party in the North who 
sympathized with their antagonism to a strong centralized 
Union ; and they could count on the timidity of the purely 
commercial interests of that section to defer to any bluster- 
ing demands they might make to maintain control. But 
at last, in spite of these elements of weakness in the North 
— in spite of broken compromises, subservient national 
legislation and judicial prostitution — the Southern politi- 
cians between 1856 and 1860 began to discern faint out- 
lines of the hand-writing on the wall. As the anti-slavery 
feeling in the North— intensified, strengthened, consoli- 
dated by the events beginning about 1845 — manifested it3 
growing power, it began to clearly appear that with Bu- 
chanan's term would end the ascendancy of the slavery 
regime at Washington ; that the Democratic party was 



THE FINAL DEFIANCE. 99 

about to lose its supremacy and the South, its dominion 
over the Kepublic. That wing of the Democratic party in 
the South which had always dictated its attitude towards 
slavery, which had long been prepared for a rupture the 
instant its grip on the Government was broken, helped on 
this contingency by dividing the counsels of the party in 
the convention at Charleston. Xhus when the three parties 
got their tickets into the field in the summer of 1860, the 
inevitable result was revealed as by a flash. Then, defi- 
nitely and at last, the conspirators in the Cotton States 
threw off the mask they had so loosely worn and declared 
their defiance of the ISTorth, their contempt for the Union, 
their purpose not to abide the result of the election if it 
should be adverse to their candidate. "In a day — in an 
hour almost — " wrote Frances Ann Kemble, an English- 
woman, in London, in January, 1863, "those stood face to 
face as mortal enemies who were fellow citizens of the 
same country, subjects of the same government, children of 
the same soil; and the N'orth, incredulous and amazed, 
found itself suddenly summoned to retrieve, its lost power 
and influence, to assert the dignity of the insulted Union 
against the rebellious attempt of the South to overthrow 
it." 

SOUTHERN POLITICAL AECHITECTURE. 

All plans for disunion and the setting up of a South- 
ern government looked to a purely aristocratic structure 
on a slave foundation. The Southern scheme had first 
been by spreading their institution all over the public do- 
main and compelling government protection in the free 
States, to give slavery a national standing; a purpose 

L.o'C. 



100 THE EENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

clearly outlined by Calhoun and supported by the Dred 
Scott obiter dictum. All these plans were based on the 
"great truth" afterwards discovered by Alexander H. 
Stephens, that "the negro is not equal to the white man 
and that slavery is his natural and normal condition." 
Mr. Chestnut, of South Carolina, had some years before 
described the negro as the "mud-sill" of Southern society. 
He resolved the economic problem into the very simple 
proposition that capital should own labor ; and on this 
mud-sill of subject-labor was to be reared the graceful 
structure of a Southern society and government. By the 
time the conspiracy had culminated, the application of 
these theories to the E^orth had been found impracticable, 
and Southern statesmen were looking to the establishment 
of a separate slave republic in the South. The failure of 
Southern plans to posses all the territories, the check to 
the formation of new slave States, due to the wonderful 
growth and energy of the North, spreading out and pos- 
sessing the public domain, embittered the Southern con- 
spirators and gave edge to their hatred of the free l^orth 
and to their schemes for separation and retaliation. 

The Virginia convention of 1861 had a committee on 
"constitutional reforms," with Alexander H. H. Stuart, 
as chairman. Through this committee an effort was made 
to eliminate from the State constitution such democratic 
features as free suffrage. Even the mixed basis had not 
sufficed to keep the vulgar non-slaveholding whites from 
acquiring an unpleasant degree of power and influence. 
Something further was needed. Some of the committee's 
conclusions were stated in a report made by Mr. Stuart^ 
from which is this extract : 



POLITICAL DILETTANTISM. 101 

In the opinion of your committee, no system of government 
can afford permanent and effectual security to life, liberty and 
property which rests on the basis of unlimited suffrage. In the 
South, all who are in a condition of servitude are necessarily 
excluded from the exercise of political privileges, and the power 
of the country is wielded by the more intelligent classes, who 
have a permanent interest in the well-being of society. Slavery 
also constitutes an effectual barrier against that tendency to 
antagonism between labor and capital which exists in the North 
There capital is the casual employer of labor and interested in 
diminishing its wages. Here capital is the owner of labor and 
naturally seeks to enhance its rewards. [!] 

Concerning this proposed restriction on suffrage, De 
Boiv's Review for ISTovember, 1861, took up tlie question 
in an elaborate article on "The Perils of Peace." The 
editor said : 

The obvious danger of an immense Yankee immigration 
which will paralyze the Border States at the ballot-box unless 
such restrictions are placed upon the right of suffrage as will 
prevent them from ever voting, are painted in letters of light. 
We have often referred to this danger as one which if we no not 
provide against it will render all the blood and treasure ex- 
pended in this war entirely profitless. 

The Richmond Whig, earlj in 1803, referred to the 
"Yankees" as being "in open and flagrant insurrection 
against their natural lords and masters, the gentlemen of 
the South.' \Yhen they are again reduced to subjection," 
observed the Whig, "we must take care to put such tram- 
mels about them that they will never have an opportunity 
to play these tricks again." 

Robert Barnwell Rhett said at Charleston : 

It is no experiment that free government existed in slave- 
holding countries. The republics of Rome and Greece were built 
on domestic slavery. But it is an experiment to maintain free 
government on universal suffrage. 



102 THE SENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

De Bow's, in October, declared that the maxims of 
''the greatest good to the greatest number" and "the ma- 
jority shall rule" are "pestilent and pernicious dogmas." 
"The institution of a Senate and hereditary executive," it 
said, "is the political form best suited to the genius and 
most expressive of the ideas of Southern civilization." 

ALL FOE SLAVERY. 

Some of the old secessionists at this late day would 
like to make the world believe their revolt was solely in 
vindication of the State sovereignt}^ dogma — dead as that 
dogma now confessedly is — not in behalf of slavery. This 
might impose on some of the later generation not familiar 
personally witk the circumstances attendant upon the 
opening and prosecution of the rebellion or the conditions 
in the slave States which led up to it; but the claim is 
contradicted by all the facts. Without going back of 1861, 
it is sufficient to note that every demand in behalf of the 
South bore the same burden of greater safe-guards for 
slavery where it existed and the extension of its preroga- 
tive into the territories and free States. This pretense 
insults the public intelligence. The truth was frankly con- 
fessed in the Richmond convention by Haymond, of 
Marion, in his two days' speech on taxation. In answer 
to the question, as he put it. What has involved Virginia 
in the position to make it necessary for her to consider 
whether she shall longer remain in the Union ? Mr. Hay- 
mond said : "It is not with a view of prejudicing the in- 
stitution of slavery — for I am a slave-holder myself to a 
limited extent — that I answer that all has grown out of the 



ALL FOR SLAVEEY. 103 

institution of slavery. It is alone the dangers which 
threaten that institution that has made it necessary for 
Virginia citizens to come together and consider solemnly 
whether the protectio7i and safety of her interests as con- 
nected with that institution do not malce it necessary for 
her to destroy the Union." 

In the South Carojina convention, in December, 1860, 
declaring the "justifying causes of secession," Lawrence 
M. Keitt said he was 'Svilling to rest the issue of disunion 
upon the question of slavery. It is," he said, ''the great 
central point from which we are now proceeding." 

It is slavery that has made the Southerners rebels to their 
government, traitors to their covintry and the originators of the 
bloodiest civil war that ever disgraced humanity and civilization. 

So in 1863 wrote Frances Ann Kcmble to a friend in 
England. She was the wife of a Georgia planter; had 
lived on his rice and cotton plantations at the mouth of 
the xVltamaha, and had written a journal of her experi- 
ences there. 

Mr. Preston, of South Carolina, one of the commis- 
sioners to the Virginia Convention, declared that "South- 
ern civilization could not exist without African slavery." 
Leonard W. Spratt, of the same State, wrote that the 
South was "now in the formation of a slave republic ;" 
and he advised the South to avow and affirm slavery "not 
as an existing fact, but as a living principle of social order, 
and assert its right not to toleration only, but to political 
recognition among the nations of the earth. If, in short," 
he adds, "you shall own slavery as the source of your 



104 THE EKXDEXG OF VIRGINIA. 

authority and act for it, and erect, as you are commissioned 
to erect, not only a Southern but a slave republic, the work 
will be accomplished." 

Alexander H. Stephens, Vice-President of the Con- 
federate States, in an address at Savannah, March 21, 
1861, in explanation and vindication of the Confederate 
constitution, said that instrument had put at rest forever 
the question as to the "proper status of the negro in our 
form of civilization. This was the immediate cause of the 
late rupture. Jefferson in his forecast had anticipated 
this as the rock upon which the old Union would split. He 
was right." Mr. Stephens also said: "The corner-stone 
of the Confederate government rests upon the great truth 
that the negro is not equal to the white man ; that slavery 
is his natural and normal condition. This stone, which 
was rejected by the first builders, is become the chief stone 
of the corner in our edifice." 

The Richmond Convention's committee on Federal re- 
lations, in their report of March 9th, took substantially 
the same ground. Every proposition submitted by the 
Peace Conference, in Crittenden's resolutions, by the Con- 
gressional caucus — every proposition submitted by any- 
body anywhere at this period as a condition on which the 
South would submit to the election of Lincoln and remain 
in the Union — was a recognition of the dogma respecting 
the negro thus bluntly stated by Mr. Stephens, and looked 
to the aggrandizement and supremacy of slavery. Yet 
John Goode, a relict of the Virginia Convention of 1861, 
and president of another Virginia Convention this year of 
grace, 1901, tried in 1900 to make the world believe that 



IlSr ITS TRUE COLORS. 105 

the rebellion was not undertaken by Virginia in behalf of 
slavery — only in vindication of the abstraction of "State 
sovereignty." 

THE IRREPRESSIBLE CONFLICT. 

The London Times article from which we have pre- 
viously quoted, went to the heart of the controversy over 
which the South and jSTorth had at last been brought face 
to face — the irrepressible conflict between two systems of 
civilization under one government. The Times saw the 
question as it appeared to the whole world outside of the 
South : 

Between the North and the South, there is this moment rag- 
ing a controversy which goes as deep as any controversy can 
into the elementary principles of human nature and the 
sympathies and antipathies which in so many men supply the 
place of reason and reflection. The North is for freedom, the 
South for slavery. The North is for freedom of discussion; 
the South represses freedom of discussion with the tar-brush 
and the pine faggot. Slavery used to be treated as a thoroughly 
exceptional institution — as the evil legacy of evil times; as a 
disgrace to a Constitution founded on the natural freedom and 
independence of mankind. But the United States became 
possessed of Louisiana and Florida; they have conquered Texas; 
they have made Arkansas and Missouri into States; and these 
successive acquisitions have altered entirely the view with which 
slavery is regarded. Perhaps as much as anything, from the 
long license enjoyed by the editors of the South of writing what 
they pleased in favor of slavery with the absolute certainty that 
no one would be found bold enough to write anything on the 
other side and thus make himself a mark for popular venge- 
ance, the subject has come to be written on in a tone of 
ferocious and singular extravagance which to a European eye 
is absolutely appalling. The South has become enamored of her 
shame. Free labor is denounced as degrading and disgraceful; 



106 THE RENDING OF VIKGINIA, 

the honest triumphs of the poor man who works his way to in- 
dependence are treated with scorn and contempt. It is asserted 
that what we are in the habit of regarding as the honorable 
pursuits of industry incapacitate a nation for civilization and re- 
finement, and that no institutions can be really free and demo- 
cratic which do not rest, like those of Athens and Rome, on a 
broad substratum of slavery. 

dickens' portrayal of slavery. 

Slavery was one of the things Charles Dickens came to 
America to study in 1842 ; and after examining the insti- 
tution at short range, he told the world in American Xotes 
what he thought of it. He divided owners into three 
classes. Here is his estimate of the second : 

The second consists of those owners, breeders, users, buyers 
and sellers who will until the bloody chapter has a bloody end 
breed, use, buy and sell them at all hazards; w^ho doggedly deny 
the horrors of the system in the teeth of such a mass of evidence 
as was never brought to bear on any other subject and to which 
the experience of every day contributes its immense amount; 
who would at this or any other moment gladly involve America 
in a war, civil or foreign, provided that it had for its sole end 
and object the assertion of their right to perpetuate slavery and 
to whip and work and torture slaves, unquestioned by any hu- 
man authority and unassailed by any human power; w^ho when 
they speak of freedom mean the freedom to oppress their kind 
and to be savage, merciless and cruel; and of whom every man 
on his own account in Republican America is a more exacting 
and a sterner and less responsible despot than a Caliph Haroun 
al Raschid in his angry robe of scarlet. 

EXUENT DON QUIXOTE. 

This is the way American slavery looked to the outside 
world, ^ot so to those who were conspiring to promote 
and perpetuate it. They were looking to Utopia ; and 



AN nSTTIMELY FROST. lU7 

through the g-low of an imagination inflamed by a century 
of irresponsible rule, they saw themselves, like the knights 
of the feudal age, standing on the neck of a prostrate race, 
and rising on the view they beheld the splendor of a new 
and unexampled chivalry ; which, disdaining the sordid 
considerations attendant on the details of trade and in- 
dustry — the vulgar perplexities that grow out of the rela- 
tions of employer and employed in free society, where 
labor is paid for — could devote its refined attention to the 
exercise of political direction, on the one hand, and to 
polite life and social felicity, on the other. But the award 
of the sword, to which they appealed, was against these 
budding aristocrats. From these dreams of social and 
political efflorescence, invested by their fancy with ama- 
ranthine bloom and immortal fragrance, how rude the 
awakening ! Where now are these heralds of the new order 
of a slave-founded chivalry in America ? How is it with 
them now, only forty years after they were about to enter 
upon the rearrangement of social and economic order ? In 
the picturesque words of Carlyle, applied to greater figures 
in history, they are "gone into the night. They are all 
gone ; sunk — down, down, with the tumult they made ; 
and the whirling and the trampling of ever new genera- 
tions passes over them ; and they hear it not any more for- 
ever." 



CHAPTER IV. 

THE ROPE OF SAND— THE BAND OF STEEL. 

LEGAL VS. REVOLUTIONARY. 

Let US consider briefly the mode of separation which 
had already been adopted by the Gulf States and was now 
being pressed upon Virginia. This whole Southern revolt 
must be justified, if at all, on one of two theories. It was 
the assertion of either a legal right or the right of revolu- 
tion. Legal rights are to be determined by the written 
law. The right of revolution for cause is never ques- 
tioned ; but without good cause it may be a cfime of stu- 
pendous proportions. The claim that secession was a legal 
right must be decided by an appeal to the national Con- 
stitution. 

OLDER THAN THE CONSTITUTION. 

The theory of secession and nullification — two forms of 
the same thing, the assertion of State sovereignty as 
against national sovereignty — is as old as the Constitution 
itself; older, for it raised its head in the original Con- 
federation. The surrender of assumed sovereignty by the 
States — a thing none of them ever really possessed, for 
they had surrendered the claim to it even under the Ar- 
ticles — ^was fought bitterly by some of the States in the 

108 



NULLIFIEKS VIKGINIA AND SOUTH CAROLINA, 109 

discussions on the Constitution ; and though consolidation 
triumphed and the claim for State independence in the 
exercise of national functions was absolutely surrendered 
in the Constitution, the dogma, as an abstraction, sur- 
vived ; and after the enactment of the ''alien and sedition'^ 
laws, raised its head again in the Virginia and Kentucky 
resolutions of 1798 and 1799. 

VIRGINIA NULLIFIEKS. 

The Virginia resolves were drawn by Madison, who in 
the Convention had been the foremost and ablest advo- 
cate of nationality, but who now declared the right of the 
States to "interpose" against the encroachments of the cen- 
tral government (of which they were to be the judge), 
while the Kentucky resolves, drawn by Jefferson, used the 
word "nullification" as the remedy. So jealous were the 
States of their prerogatives — so afraid of centralization — 
that it was only as a choice of supposed evils that the Con- 
stitution was at last agreed to. Von Hoist says it was 
"extorted from the crowning necessity of a reluctant 
people" so jealous for their liberties that they were on the 
brink of ruin for lack of unity and mutual concession. 
Webster said in the Senate that "the Union had its origin 
in the necessities of disordered finance, prostrate commerce 
and ruined credit." 

CALHOUN IMPROVES ON THEM. 

Though this dogma dated from so early a period, it had 
not before been so exhaustively formulated as by Calhoun 
about 1832. He took as his starting-point the assumption 



110 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

that SO far from the Constitution being the work of the 
American people collectively, no such political body had 
ever existed ; that the people of the United States had been 
federated not as individual citizens, but as political mu- 
nicipalities — that is to say. States; that the articles of 
ratification themselves declared the Constitution to be 
binding between the States ratifying. From the use of 
this phrase he argued that the Constitution was the work 
of the States and that there was no direct connection be- 
tween the citizen and the national government; that it 
was only through ratification by the State that the indi- 
vidual became a citizen of the United States. Tyler put 
the creed even more acutely by saying he "owed obedience 
to the laws of the Union because he owed allegiance to 
Virginia." This was the precise ground on which the 
secession doctrinaires stood in 1861. They claimed they 
were citizens of the United States only because the State 
had made them so, and that the State could unmake this 
citizenship at pleasure. This would have left the Union 
but a rope of sand ; but the fatal weakness of Calhoun's 
theory was that it was founded on an untruth. The rati- 
fication was not by States as municipalities nor by bodies 
representing them. The ratifying conventions expressly 
chosen for the purpose represented the people in each 
State, in whose name the Constitution had been drawn. 
The people could not ratify in the mass. They had in the 
necessary formalities to utilize local bodies, and the agency 
of conventions had been prescribed. But all the conven- 
tions in their act of ratification recognized the popular 
character of the act. "We, the people of Virginia," said 



THE OLD CONFEDEEATION. Ill 

the Convention of 1788. The Virginia secession Conven- 
tion when it undertook, in April, 1861, to repeal that rati- 
fication, employed the same language. 

THE DOGMA IN 1861. 

The theory of secession was stated with precision in 
the platform upon which Dr. Zadok Kidwcll was a candi- 
date for Congress in the Fairmont district, in the Spring 
of 1861 (till called off by the Richmond Convention). 
Following is the declaration : 

Resolved, That we owe obedience to the Federal Government 
only because Virginia has commanded us to obey its laws; and, 
therefore, whenever Virginia shall release us from this obliga- 
tion, we will acknowledge the binding authority of that Gov- 
ernment no longer. 

Resolved, That our allegiance is due to the sovereign State 
of Virginia; and we maintain that Virginia, speaking by her 
people in sovereign convention assembled, has the right to com- 
mand the services of her citizens as against any other State, 
power, government or authority whatever. 

UNDER THE ARTICLES. 

If there is any ground for these declarations it must be 
found in the United States Constitution. Let us inquire, 
first, what excuse there would be for them under the Ar- 
ticles of Confederation which the Constitution superseded. 
The Articles created a "Confederacy" styled "The United 
States of America." Article II provided that each State 
"retains its sovereignty, freedom and independence, and 
every power, jurisdiction and right not expressly delegated 
to the United States in- Congress assembled." But the 



112 THE KENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

sovereignty and independence essential to such an act as 
secession were expressly delegated to the United States. 
The power to send or receive foreign ambassadors and to 
enter into any conference, agreement or treaty with any 
foreign power, was expressly forbidden to the States. They 
were forbidden to make any "treaty, confederation or al- 
liance whatever" between themselves; forbidden to lay 
duties or imposts in contravention of treaties; forbidden 
to keep vessels of war or military forces in time of peace 
or to engage in war without the consent of the United 
States, or to grant commissions to ships of Avar or issue 
letters of marque and reprisal ; and the United States was 
made the final arbiter in any dispute of whatever nature 
between States. In a word, none of the attributes of inde- 
pendence or sovereignty were "retained" by the States, 
the same being expressly delegated to the United States in 
Congress assembled. While this is true, these powers could 
not be exercised by the Congress without the assent of nine 
out of the thirteen States ; and such was the jealousy of 
the States that this bar was continually interposed to pre- 
vent the most necessary action by Congress in matters of 
finance and foreign relations. It was this kind of double 
cheek which put the individual States and the United 
States at such cross purposes as to make an efficient govern- 
ment for the Confederacy impossible. It was in this con- 
dition of affairs — "the necessities of disordered finance, 
prostrate commerce and ruined credit," as Mr. Webster 
stated it — that the States turned to a new form of govern- 
ment and found it under the Constitution. 

Under Article XIII, every State had been required 
to "abide by the determination of the United States in 



THE BOND OF UNION. 113 

Congress assembled on all questions which by this Con- 
federacy are submitted to them ;" and the Articles were to 
be "inviolably observed by every State, and the Union shall 
he perpetual;" nor could any alteration in the Articles be 
made unless agreed to in Congress and "afterwards con- 
firmed by the legislature of every State." 

Can anybody discover in all this standing room for 
secession ? 

UNDER THE CONSTITUTION. 

What was true under the Articles would be truer under 
the Constitution, if there were degrees in the absolute; 
for the Constitution was designed to make a still firmer 
Union. It is declared in the Constitution, Art. 6, that 
"This Constitution and the laws made in pursuance there- 
of, and all treaties made and which shall be made under 
authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law 
of the land, and the judges of every State shall be bound 
thereby, anything in. the Constitution or laws of any State 
to the contrary notwithstanding." Nothing could be more 
express or sweeping. The firm sovereign authority thus 
established is not weakened by amendments IX, X and 
XL The first provides that "the enumeration in the Con- 
stitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny 
or disparage others retained by the people ;" the Xth that 
"the powers not delegated to the United States by the Con- 
stitution nor prohibited by it to the States are reserved to 
the States respectively or to the people ;" the XTth that 
the judicial power of the United States shall not extend 

Va.— 8 



114 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

to any suit in law or equity brought against a State by a 
citizen of another State, or a citizen or subject of any for- 
eign State; in short, that a State cannot be sued. What- 
ever politicians may have sought to accomplish at the time 
by IX and X, the effect of these amendments must be lim- 
ited to subordinate matters such as are left to the control 
of each State within its own limits. J^othing in either 
can touch the supremacy of the United States in matters 
national, ''prohibited to the States." The Xlth amend- 
ment, which seems to have given Mr. Carlile some trouble 
in the Richmond Convention, is simply a specific limita- 
tion on one branch of the Government — and not one 
that exercises the political, executive, treaty-making or 
war-making jDower. 

The Constitution, like the Articles of Confederation, 
makes no provision for its own destruction. The Union 
under each was to be perpetual Mr. Madison said in the 
Convention that the Union could not be adopted by any 
State temporarily. It was to be "adopted, if at all, in 
toto and forever." There is nothing to imply that it might 
be broken except by unanimous consent. The method of 
amendment is this : Congress, by two-thirds majority in 
each House, may propose alterations, or may call a conven- 
tion to propose them on application of the legislatures of 
two-thirds of the States. But in either case, such altera- 
tions require the assent of three-fourths of the States, 
through legislatures or conventions as Congress may pre- 
scribe. When mere amendments are rendered so difficult, 
it is not to be assumed that any State may destroy the 
whole compact at pleasure ? 



WEBSTER S SLEDGE-HAMMER. 115 

NOT EVEN STANDING ROOM. 

The claim for the right of secession finds no place in 
either the present organic law of the Union nor the former 
one. It never had an existence under any American sys- 
tem ; and it would be no system under which it had an exis- 
tence. Gen. James S. Wheat, in a speech in front of the 
old court house at Wheeling, one afternoon in the Summer 
of 1861, put the question tersely and well: 

The government of the United States was created by the 
people of the United States. The people of the United States 
alone can abrogate that government; and any attempt in tho 
name of a State, or under color of its sovereignty, is nothing 
more nor less than a rebellion against the authority of the gov- 
ernment of the Union: unless it should be successful, and then 
it becomes revolution. 

THE LOGIC OF WEBSTER. 

In Webster's discussion of this question, he, in his 
profound way, went to the root of it. His argument em- 
bodied the idea that the State and the supremacy of law 
were conceptions involving each other; that there could 
be no State which was not supreme over all its parts ; that 
these parts existed for their peculiar, subordinate and 
necessary functions additional to and distinct from th? 
central supreme power without any right in conflict witli 
it. A constitution which in its terms negatived the idea 
of a supreme authority was no constitution and created no 
State — defeated its own purpose. A government must be 
supreme over all its parts or it is no government. The 



116 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

right of nullification and the conception of the State ex- 
clude each other. Both cannot exist in the same instru- 
ment. The Constitution of the United States does not 
provide for events which must be preceded by its own 
destruction. "The Constitution was received as a whole 
for the whole country. If it cannot stand all together, it 
cannot stand in parts ; and if the laws cannot be executed 
everywhere, they cannot long be executed anywhere." 

Jackson's demonstration. 

Perhaps no stronger statement refuting the whole theory 
of secession has ever been made, or can be made, than 
that contained in President Jackson's proclamation issued 
for the benefit of South Carolina : 

The ordinance adopted by the South Carolina Convention is 
not founded in the indefeasible right of resisting acts which are 
plainly unconstitutional and too oppressive to be endured, but 
on the strange position that any State may not only declare the 
acts of Congress void but paralyze their execution. . . . The 
Constitution of the United States forms a government, not a 
league. It is a government in which all the people are repre- 
sented, which operates directly on the people individually, not 
upon the States. They retained all the power they did not grant, 
but each State having expressly parted with so many powers 
as to constitute jointly with the other States a single nation, 
cannot from that period possess any right to secede, because 
such secession does not break a league but destroys the unity of 
a nation; and any injury to that unity is not only a breach 
which would result from the contravention of a compact but it 
is an offense against the whole Union. To say that any State 
may at pleasure secede from the Union is to say that the United 
States are not a nation; because it would be a solecism to con- 
tend that any part of a nation might dissolve its connection with 
other parts to their injury or ruin without committing any 



Madison's higher law. 117 

offense. Secession, like any other revolutionary act, may be 
morally justified by the extremity of oppression; but to call it a 
constitutional right is to confound the meaning of terms and 
can only be done through gross error or to deceive those who are 
willing to assert a right but would pause before they made a 
revolution or incurred the penalty consequent on a failure. 

NATIONAL UNITY. 

Bismarck said in 1872 that "Sovereignty can only be 
a unit — the sovereignty of lavv^." Dr. Draper in his "Civil 
Policy," referring to this idea of national unity, speaks 
of it as "that inappreciable privilege that has fallen to the 
lot of Americaj" and he says it was to sustain this bond 
of Union on which depended the development of national 
power that the Civil War was prosecuted by the ]S[orth 
with such inflexible resolution. "Was ever such a thing 
known in the world," he asks, "as the spending of eight 
hundred million dollars a year for four consecutive years 
to sustain an idea ?" 

If the claim of a right to secede from the American 
Union were unassailable instead of preposterous, there 
would still remain the greater and supreme law declared in 
the Convention by Mr. Madison : "The transcendent law 
of nature and nature's God which declares that the safety 
and happiness of society are the objects at which all polit- 
ical institutions aim and to which all such institutions 
must be sacrificed" if they fail to attain this end. If a 
theory of government which makes unity, safety and the 
highest good of the greatest number impossible be ever so 
pleasing as a barren abstraction, it ought to be discarded 



lis THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

for one that better secures "the safety and happiness of 
societ}^" even though it be not so attractive to the fancy 
of the doctrinaire. 

It was considerations like these that drove the people 
of the United States, after their failure to establish an 
impossible union of independent republics, into "a more 
perfect Union." Their experience under the Confedera- 
tion showed that their political existence demanded a gov- 
ernment with one supreme, unquestioned authority. Gouv- 
erneur Morris declared at that time in prophetic spirit: 
"This country must be united. If persuasion does not 
unite it, the sword will." It was believed the country 
would be united by the adoption of the Constitution ; but 
the event showed that in the toleration of slavery the germ 
of a later and greater conflict had been left in the instru- 
ment of union, in due course of time and growth to burst 
the nation wide asunder with an appeal to the arbiter fore- 
cast by Morris. 



CHAPTEE V. 

VIRGINIA OPENS THE PANDORA BOX. 

"now^ mischief^ thou akt afoot." 

As part, of the plan on which the Southern Insurrec- 
tion was working, Governor Letcher summoned the Vir- 
ginia Assembly to meet January 7, 1861. The ostensible 
purpose of the session was legislation in connection with 
the proposed sale of the James River & Kanawha Canal to 
a company of French capitalists — to raise money, prob- 
ably, to promote the arming of the State. This was as- 
signed in the Governor's message ; but much the larger 
part of the document was taken up with a discussion of 
banks and State finances. The real kernel of the message 
— not unlike the postscript to a woman's letter — was found 
in a few paragraphs relating to the question then every- 
where uppermost in the public prints and in men's minds 
— secession. As soon as sent in, this part of the message 
engrossed both houses to the exclusion of everything else. 
In other ways also this message was much out of the 
ordinary. It reads as if written by different hands guided 
by different purposes. It professed to deprecate the call- 
ing of a Convention, yet beyond doubt that was the sole 
object of assembling the Legislature. It declared the 
Union was already dissolved, and that the North was to 
blame for it. Then it undertook to state the conditions on 
which the dissolution of the Union might be prevented. 

119 



120 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

There must be a repeal of all "personal-liberty" laws and 
a rigid execution of the fugitive-slave law ; gaiaranties for 
the protection of slavery in the District of Columbia — no 
abolishment there unless Maryland should emancipate, nor 
then unless demanded by the citizens of the District; 
guaranties that slavery be not interdicted in any territory 
either by territorial legislature or by Congress ; owners to 
have right to carry their slaves through free States and 
Territories and be compensated for any lost in transit; 
guaranties that the domestic slave-trade be not interefered 
with; punishment of assaults (like John Brown's) on the 
slave-holding States with intent to incite insurrection. 
And, most humiliating of all, the United States "to be de- 
prived of the power of appointing to local offices at places 
in slave States persons hostile to their institutions or inim- 
ical to their rights." 

A caucus of Congressmen from fourteen central States 
was held in Washington about this time; and the condi- 
tions for the security of the South presented by them are 
so strikingly like Mr. Letcher's they need not be recited. 
The conclusions of the caucus were embodied in resolu- 
tions introduced in the House by Etheridge of Tennessee. 
They added the condition, afterwards put into the Peace 
Conference report, to restrict the acquisition of territory. 

RUSHING INTO REVOLUTION. 

Thus we approach this critical juncture with a series 
of demands on all sides for the protection of slavery. No- 
body anywhere was asking for guaranties in behalf of free- 
dom. It plainly appears from the uniformity of these de- 
mands that the summoning of the Virginia Legislature at 



VIRGINIA CONVENTION CALLED. 121 

this time was part of a plan carefully preconcerted. This 
was shown still more sharply by the character of the prop- 
ositions immediately brought forward in the Assembly. 
The conspirators could not wait for the full reading of 
the long message ; but in one house as soon as the portion 
relating to Federal matters had been read, the further 
reading was dispensed with. In the Senate Mr. Douglas 
introduced resolutions setting forth that ''the use of force 
by the general government, by land or sea, directly or indi- 
rectly, for the purpose of maintaining the Union" would 
be subversive, destructive, etc., of the rights of the States 
and "revolutionary;" that Virginia would not consent 
that any seceded State should be coerced and that she 
would resist "all attempts by the Federal government to 
overthrow and destroy the Union." It provokes a smile, 
this idea that the government of the Union was trying to 
destroy the Union by enforcing its laws ! But nothing was 
too absurd for the madness of that time. 

CONVENTION CALLED. 

In the House, Bassel of Upshur offered resolutions of 
similar import; and a committee of fifteen was imme- 
diately raised and instructed, by unanimous vote, to re- 
port a bill for a convention. There was no deliberation — 
no hesitation, but all the precipitancy of a revolution al- 
ready resolved on. A proposition to first submit to the 
people of the State whether they wanted a convention was 
offered in the House but voted down by a large majority. 
The minority in the Assembly did extort the condition 
that when electing delegates to the convention the people 



122 THE KENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

miffht vote whether the action of the convention should or 
should not be referred to them for approval or rejection ; 
but, as we shall see, this condition was ruthlessly violated. 
The concession was not made in good faith. There was no 
intention that the condition should be observed. The bill 
had been so drawn that it would be in the power of the 
Convention to revise the Constitution, and thus to so amend 
it as to provide for a fairer system of taxation and for 
representation in the Senate on the white basis. But it is 
api^arent this was only a lure to catch the Western con- 
stitutiencies, the programme of the conspirators contem- 
plating that revolution should be precipitated (as it was) 
before any such remedial measures could become effective. 
The Enquirer denounced this "reference" to the people as 
"imperiling all that Virginians hold most sacred and 
dear." 

NO TIME FOE CONSIDEEATION. 

The election was ordered for February 4th. Only 
three weeks were allowed for the canvass; and the con- 
vention was to meet on the 13th, nine days after the elec- 
tion. There was hot haste all around, if we consider the 
gravity of the proceeding. In the House, January 9th, 
Joseph Segar protested against such precipitancy. "For 
heaven's sake," he urged, "give us a little more time — one 
short day's time at least — to j)onder over these great ques- 
tions, the most important ever presented for the reflection 
of American freemen ; one brief day's pause for thinking 
on these thrilling matters." Dr. Kives, who replied, said 
the only amendment the bill needed was to shorten the 
time for the assembling of the Convention. Wilson, from 



BUCHANAN DRAWS BACK. 123 

Isle of Wight, declared it was "no time for delay. Delays 
were dangerous." He was for "action — action immediate 
and decisive. I cannot," he said, "sing paeans to a Union 
that is dead. While it existed it was a Union of wrong, of 
injustice, of insult, and oppression. It was born with the 
seeds of disease. It has sustained itself a body of political 
corruption and putrifying sores, having the form of Union 
while the essence is dead. It stinks in the nostrils of all 
men ; and it is high time Virginia freed herself from the 
body of this death." The following day Mr. Seddon of 
Safford read a telegram announcing that the Star of the 
West approaching Fort Sumter with provisions had been 
cannonaded back to sea. "The announcement brought 
down loud and tumultuous applause from the galleries." 

TO MAINTAIN THE STATUS QUO. 

One of the things this Legislature did was to propose 
a suspension of the functions of the United States govern- 
ment with reference to the rebellious States. They ap- 
pointed John Tyler a commissioner to wait on the Presi- 
dent and Judge Robertson a commissioner to the seceded 
States, requesting the President and the authorities of 
those States to abstain, pending action by Virginia, from 
acts calculated to produce a collision between those States 
and the government. President Buchanan had apparently 
begun to realize the abyss towards which the conspirators 
had been leading him and was drawing back from the con- 
sequences of his (let us say) pusillanimity. He had begun 
to take counsel with men like Edwin M. Stanton and 
Joseph Holt. He replied to the Virginia commissioner 



124 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

that he had no power to make such an agreement as re- 
quested. Meanwhile the Legislature authorized an appro- 
priation of a million dollars for the ''defence" of the State. 

ELECTRIC RICHMOND. 

The storm-cloud was rapidly darkening. A Richmond 
letter to the Wheeling Intelligencer January 9th, two days 
after the Assembly met, begins : 

The very air here is charged with the electric thunders of 
war. On the street, at the capitol, in the bar-room, at the din- 
ner-table, nothing is heard but resistance to the general govern- 
ment and sympathy with the cause of South Carolina. In the 
Legislature the great aim, even amongst most of the Western 
members, appears to be to hurry things and precipitate a crisis. 

A Richmond private letter of the same date said: 

To say that the excitement is intense would give the cold- 
blooded people of your latitude a faint idea of the public feeling 
here. Everybody is feverish and a great many perfectly wild. 

TO WED THE CONFEDERACY. 

January 21st, the Assembly rounded out their program 
of insurrection by the passage of a declaration that "if all 
efforts fail to reconcile the existing differences between 
the two sections of the country, it is the duty of Virginia 
to unite her destiny with the slaveholding States of the 
South." 

THE ONLY WAY. 

A dispatch was sent from Washington to Rich- 
mond January 26th signed by the Virginia senators, Ma- 
son and Hunter, and by eight Virginia congressmen, in- 
cluding Albert Gallatin Jenkins, advising the Assembly 



WESTEKN VIRGINIA HEARD FROM. 125 

to press for "decided action by the people of Virginia in 
convention" as the "surest means under providence of avert- 
ing the impending Civil War and preserving the hope of 
reconstructing the Union already dissolved." [ !] 

"WEST VIRGINIA MEETS THE CRISIS. 

Although the time was short and the season inclement, 
a keen interest was excited throughout the State by these 
summary proceedings. The canvass was brief but sharp. 
Candidates were required to define decisively their atti- 
tude on the question of secession. The issue was too men- 
acing to admit of indifference or evasion. 

A Union meeting had been held at Parkersburg Janu- 
ary 1st, in which Gen. John J. Jackson, Arthur L Bore- 
man and J. M. Stephenson took part, at which it was re- 
solved : 

That the doctrine of secession had no warrant in the Con- 
stitution and would be fatal to the Union and to all the purposes 
of its creation. Secession was revolution. 

That the laws of the United States were as binding on 
South Carolina as before her secession. 

That nothing in the election of Lincoln afforded a reason- 
able ground for the abandonment of the government. 

That the proposed call for a convention was at the instiga- 
tion of the enemies of the Union and intended to precipitate 
secession. 

That the Legislature had no constitutional power to call a 
convention for the purpose of changing the relation of Virginia 
to the United States. 

That they would not be bound by the action of such conven- 
tion unless any proposed alteration of such relation was first 
submitted to and sanctioned by the people at an election giving 
ample time for discussion. 

That they demanded the white basis of representation and 
ad valorem taxation. 



126 THE EEN^DING OF VIEGINIA. 

Large meetings held at Clarksburg and in the Athe- 
naeum at Wheeling adopted similar declarations. 

DIVISION DEMANDED. 

The Wellshiirg Herald of January 4th remarked that 
'^the talk about a division of Virginia in case of an at- 
tempted dissolution of the Union" did not "seem to be los- 
ing any earnestness or quantity. The idea of annexing 
the Panhandle counties to Pennsylvania," adds the Her- 
ald, "has but few supporters, but the supporters of the 
other project are very numerous." 

The Tyler County Plaindealer of same date remarked: 

No ties bind us to Eastern Virginia but the unjust laws they 
h^ave made. In no way are we, nor ever can be, of them. Our 
location, our trade, our interest in every way, admonish us to 
separate ourselves, to protect ourselves while the power to pro- 
tect is left us. We are for secession at once, and let the Blue 
Ridge of mountains be the line. 

The editor of the Plaindealer was J. Edgar Boyer, who 
became the first Secretary of State of West Virginia. 

About this time, the Morgantown Star, edited by Mar- 
shall Dent, a Douglas Democrat, who went to the Rich- 
mond convention, said : 

The people of West Virginia have borne the burden just 
about as long as we can stand it. We have been hewers of wood 
and drawers of water for Eastern Virginia long enough, and it 
is time that section understood it; and it is time that our would- 
be leaders in our own section understood it. 

A lettc'r from Amacetta, Wayne county, written Janu- 
ary 16th (by Z. D. Ramsdell, I think,) declared that "Vir- 
ginia must be divided. The West must and shall be a free 



A MAN WHO HAD NERVE. 127 

and independent State under the name and title of West 
Virginia." This was a good guess, if we consider the date 
this was written. 

The propriety of a division of Virginia began to be 
talked about in other jjarts of the country even before the 
issue was distinctly raised in ISTorthwestern Virginia. The 
Providence Journal about the beginning of the year said 
Virginia was quite large enough to make two States; that 
Western Virginia had territory enough and all natural 
advantages to make a flourishing State. 

A letter from Clarksburg January 12th said : "We 
intend if eastern Virginia secedes to raise the banner of 
separate State sovereignty in Western Virginia and re- 
main in the Union." 

A MINORITY OF ONE. 

In the Virginia Senate January 8th, on the resolu- 
tions committing the State to a position hostile to the 
government, of the 36 senators voting Alfred Caldwell of 
Wheeling voted a solitary "jSTo." In the House Arthur I. 
Boreman and four other Western men of whom ISTathaniel 
Richardson was one, also voted no. Alfred Caldwell, who 
cast this lonely vote, was a man not afraid to be in a 
minority. He was one of the most sagacious and resolute 
Republicans in the Northwest. As Seward once said of 
Stephen A. Douglas, his coat-tails came pretty near the 
ground ; but if his limbs were not long, his head was ; and 
for many years he played a strong hand in the municipal 
politics of Wheeling, being especially influential with the 
German element. On the election of Mr. Lincoln, Mr. 
Caldwell chose to go into exile and accepted the consulship 



128 



THE KEN DING OF VIRGINIA. 




Gibson L. Cranmek. 



at Honolulu, whore he remained six years, returning to 
Wheeling in the autumn of 1867. He took no further part 
in public affairs and died a year or so later. 



HOT TIME IN WHEELING. 



At Wheeling, Gibson L. Cranmer, afterwards secretary 
of the May and June conventions, in a card printed J anu- 
ary 18th accepting candidacy for the Convention, concluded 
by saying that in the event of secession by Virginia, he 
was in favor, "as a last resort, of a separation." 

In a card defining his attitude, Chester D. Hubbard 
of Wheeling said : "With reference to a possible division 



AGITATION IN THE PANHANDLE. 129 

of the State, I regard it as I do secession, something not 
to he thought of or talked of — a remedy infinitely worse 
than the disease." But this was an exceptional note 
among Union men. Xearly everywhere in the Northwest 
the sentiment expressed was for a division if driven to it 
by attempted secession. 

In "Wheeling the canvass was hot. The following ques- 
tions were put (in print) to the candidates there: 

Will you (1) vote against secession? (2) Demand an 
ad valorem tax on all property without discrimination ? 
(3) Demand the white basis of representation in the Sen- 
ate ? Thoinas H. Logan replied : ''I unhesitatingly answer 
all these questions in the affirmative." Andrew F. Ross 
declared he was "For the Union first, last and all the 
time." Thomas Sweeney maintained "the right and power 
of the general government to enforce the laws," but "under 
existing circumstances" denied "the policy of coercion or 
armed invasion." He stated the question as being: "Shall 
we have comj)romise or war ?" 

Mr. Sweeney was looked upon as the secession candi- 
date, but Avas not willing to admit it. The following ques- 
tions addressed to him were printed in the papers ; and he, 
not replying, were sent to him in person : 

Would you vote for the secession of Virginia from the 
Federal Union? 

Would you sign an ordinance of secession should one he 
passed ? 

Mr. Sweeney refused to pledge himself. One corre- 
spondent (S. H. Woodward, I think) asked for categorical 
reply to the following: 

Va— 9 



130 THE RENDING OF VIEG'INIA. 

Have you or have you not said that in your opinion it would 
be to the interest of the City of Wheeling for the State of 
Virginia to secede because it would make her a great manufac- 
turing emporium? Yes or no. 

Do you believe the State of Virginia ought to withdraw from 
the Union for any at present existing cause? Yes or no. 

Do you believe a State can secede by its own right? Yes 
or no. 

Will you if elected oppose by all means in your power, and 
use all your influence as well as your vote, to prevent secession 
under all circumstances and for whatever pretext? Yes or no. 

Mr. Sweeney did not reply. 

HIGH TEMPEKATUEES ELSEWHERE. 

Campbell Tarr, in Brooke County, declared himself 
utterly opposed to secession in any contingency. 

A Union meeting in Hancock January 21st pledged to 
support no man who would not "clearly and unequivocally 
pledge himself if elected to support the laws of the United 
States as they now stand or until altered or amended as 
therein prescribed, and oppose secession in every shape 
and form." 

In Monongalia County, Marshall M. Dent promised 
to "oppose secession of Virginia from the Union under 
any event, to advocate amendments to the Constitution 
taxing property according to value and establishing the 
white basis of representation." 

The tightest resolutions of instruction adopted by any 
public meeting were adopted at Clarksburg January 19th. 
They were offered by John J. Davis. It was resolved to 
support no man for the convention : 

Who is not unequivocally opposed to secession and will not 
so pledge himself; 



DECLAKING FOR DIVISION. 131 

Who will not pledge himself to vote against the appointment 
of persons to represent Virginia in any convention having for 
its object the establishment of a provisional government, or of 
persons to any body convened for the purpose of forming a 
Southern Confederacy or other government; 

Who will not pledge himself to vote against any ordinance, 
resolution or motion that has for its object the withdrawal of 
the State from the Federal Union; 

Who will not pledge himself to vote against any resolution 
to be laid down as an ultimatum, the refusal of which by other 
States to be considered just cause for seceding from the Union; 

Who believes that the Convention to meet at Richmond, 
February 13, 1861, or any State authority, can absolve the citizen 
of this State from his allegiance to the general government; 

Who does not believe the federal government has the right 
of self-preservation; 

Who will not oppose all deliberation and discussion by mem- 
bers of said Convention in secret session. 

On these resolutions John S. Carlile and Charles S. 
Lewis were nominated for the Convention. 

January 28th a meeting in Marshall County adopted 
resolutions patterned after this Clarksburg platform. 

January 21stj at the largest meeting ever held in Wood 
County, Gen. John J. Jackson was nominated at Parkers- 
burg for the Convention, on a platform of unconditional 
Unionism. 

A meeting at Cameron January 26th declared "unfal- 
tering devotion to the Union ;" that West Virginia would 
not be governed by any action of the Convention dissolv- 
ing our connection with the Federal government ; and in- 
structing delegates in event of secession "to take steps for 
dissolving our connection with the eastern part of the 
State." Yet this Convention, professing these sentiments 



132 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

committed the absurdity of "denying the right of seces- 
sion" and ''condemning the policy of coercion" in the 
same resolution. They advocated ad valorem taxation, de- 
clared they would support no candidate of known disunion 
sentiments, but demanded the repeal of "all obnoxious 
laws having a tendency to violate the Constitution of the 
United States" — probably meaning the personal liberty 
laws. The elements in this Convention appear to have been 
mixed ; and from a resolution endorsing Hon. Sherrard 
Clemens and the Crittenden compromise, it might be in- 
ferred Mr. Clemens had been plowing with the Marshall 
heifer. 

A meeting held in Hancock the day before also en- 
dorsed the Crittenden plan and declared that if a com- 
promise could not be agreed on "and we are left to choose 
between sej)aration and Civil War, then we choose peaceable 
separation in preference to the horrors of Civil War (the 
legitimate offspring of coercion) as the best remedy." Ben 
Griffith, Daniel F. Connell, Joseph Burns and Joseph W. 
Allison were the "peace-at-any-price" committee who re- 
])orted these unpatriotic utterances. E. Langfitt was pres- 
ident of the meeting and Dan. Donahoo secretary. It is 
fitting these names should go down in such a connection 
to posterity. 

Another Marshall County meeting January Sith 
passed resolutions of unqualified loyalty, and one of them 
declared that if Virginia seceded they pledged themselves 
to do their utmost to secure a separate State. 

A (so-called) "Union" Convention in Wheeling Janu- 
ary 30th, in their first resolution declared "unalterable 
opposition to secession;" in the second their belief that 



CONTEMNING THE PANHANDLE. 133 

the Crittenden plan as a basis of compromise would be 
"fair and just to all parties," but were ''disposed to agree 
to any plan of adjustment which would give perfect equal- 
ity to the States in the common territories of the country." 
The resolutions were carried nem. con., but the meeting 
after holding three sessions broke up in confusion without 
naming candidates. 

January 31st, Chester D. Hubbard announced himself 
a candidate for the Convention in Ohio County. He 
pledged himself to "try to be faithful to you, to Virginia 
and to the Union." The Intelligencer said, in printing his 
announcement, that Mr. Hubbard would "never sign an 
ordinance of secession should it be passed." 

A meeting at Hartford City, Mason County, declared 
the election of Lincoln was no cause for a dissolution of 
the Union. 

A meeting in Wetzel County, of which George W. Bier 
was president, Samuel I. Robinson secretary and James 
G. West chairman on resolutions, sent up an equivocal 
note. The resolutions pronounce secession "unwise until 
all peaceful remedies are exhausted ;" that "all State laws 
having any bearing directly or indirectly to nullify or 
prevent the just execution of the fugitive-slave law should 
be at once repealed." Mr. West got his second wind later ; 
and in the Legislature of the Restored Government he was 
the fiercest Unionist in that body, not excepting Farns- 
worth. 

The Richmond Whig of January 31st, referring to the 
candidacy of Sherrard Clemens for Convention in Ohio 
County, expresses the Richmond scorn for the "Black Re- 
publican" Panhandle in the remark : "the county that gave 
Lincoln 771 votes !" 



134 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA, 

The Alexandria Gazette ^ discussing the demands AA^cst- 
ern Virginia was expected to make in the convention for 
the white basis and ad valorem taxation, said if the East 
"withheld these rights "it wonld take a hundred thousand 
bayonets from a Southern Confederacy to force Western 
Virginia into a union with the Cotton States." 

A FUGITIVE-SLAVE RECLAIMED. 

January 24th was completed the rendition under the 
fugitive-slave law of a negro girl who had run away from 
Wheeling and taken refuge in Cleveland. This was prob- 
ably the last rendition ever made under that law. It will 
be seen that the owner and his counsel claimed it was an 
incident in the Virginia programme for "saving the 
Union," other parts of which were just then being so ener- 
getically pushed at Richmond. 

The girl, "Lucy," was the property of John Goshorn, 
of Wheeling, who was reinforced in the chase by his son, 
William S. Goshorn. She had disappeared some three 
months before. A negro woman in Cleveland betrayed her 
whereabouts to her master ; and, armed with the terrors 
of the law, the Goshorns proceeded to Cleveland to reclaim 
the fugitive. She was arrested January 19th at the house 
of a Mr. Benton and committed to jail. A writ of habeas 
corpus was issued by Judge Tilden, but on account of 
threatening demonstrations by the colored population it 
was deemed not prudent to bring the girl into court, and 
the case proceeded without her presence. The excitement 
among the colored people cooled down. They held a meet- 
ing two days later and, according to the Plaindealer, a 



A WHEELING FUGITIVE-SLAVE RECLAIMED. 135 

Democratic paper, resolved to "obey the law." The Plain- 
dealer had this to say of the case : 

The slave, Lucy, who has been wishing herself back to Old 
Virginia ever since she came to our city, it is conceded on all 
hands should go home to her master, as he promises not to sell 
her South as she feared, but is willing to let her go North on 
payment of a stipulated sum. We never witnessed so unanimous 
a public opinion in favor of law and order as now prevails in 
this city. 

Doubtless the Cleveland people wished to avoid fur- 
nishing the Secessionists at Richmond the club which a 
resistance to rendition would have armed them with. 
Thursday, 23d, Judge Spaulding, the girl's counsel, with- 
drew the defence. In doing so he said : 

Nothing now remains that may impede the performance of 
your painful duty, sir, unless I be permitted to trespass a little 
further upon your indulgence and say to this assemblage: We 
are this day offering to the majesty of constitutional law a 
homage that takes with it a virtual surrender of the finest feel- 
ings of our nature — the vanquishing of many of our strictest 
resolutions; the mortification of a freeman's pride, and I almost 
said the contravention of a Christian's duty to his God. 

Mr. Goshorn's counsel said : 

The right of slavery or the constitutionality of the fugitive- 
slave law is not involved here. The latter question has been 
decided. The duty of the court is to give effect to the law. In 
justice to the claimants, I must say they are actuated by no 
mercenary motives. Neither do they come to wake the pre- 
judices of the North. Virginia now stands in a commanding 
position and wishes to show the Southern people that the North- 
ern people will execute the laws and be faithful to the Union. 
The citizens of Cleveland have come up to their duty manfully; 
no man has laid a straw in the way of the enforcement of the 
law. 



136 THE KENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

Marshal Johnson read provisions of the United States 
law bearing on his duties, and said he had no alternative — 
he must obej them. But the girl could be purchased in 
Wheeling, and he would give $100 for that object. He 
asked permission for the elder Goshorn to speak. The old 
man accordingly made a rambling little address, in the 
course of which he said : 

I would that the task of representing Virginia had fallen to 
better hands. The South has been looking to such a case as 
this. I have no office to gain. I want to save the Union. We 
must do it if our servants will not. 

In Wheeling the Goshorns were regarded as bitter Se- 
cessionists, who, so far as known, had never felt — at least 
never shown — any anxiety to "save the Union." 

The only unpleasant incident that happened to the 
Goshorns while in Cleveland was that at the Weddel Hotel 
a colored waiter refused to serve them ; for which he was 
discharged by the proprietor, "Colonel" Eoss. 

Two other incidents connecting with this .tragedy may 
be mentioned. The Cleveland Herald reported that a 
waiter at one of the city hotels was told that his former 
master from North Carolina was in the city looking for 
him. He at once left the house and never rested till he 
had put the Canadian boundary between his master and 
himself. He had to leave a Republic to find asylum and 
liberty in a monarchy. In Toledo a hack driver attached 
to the Collins House, coming from the depot with his load 
one evening, jumped from the box as soon as he reached 
the house, not stopping to let out his passengers. Taking 
the proprietor aside, he requested payment of his wages, 



WHEELING COMMENDS THE SLAVE-CATCHEES. 137 

giving for the request this very good reason: "It's time 
for dis feller to be goin'. I's got my old massa in de car- 
riage!" If the editor of the Plaindealer heard of these 
incidents he must have wondered at the perversity of hu- 
man nature — for of course these men ought to have been 
wishing, like the girl Lucy, to get back to their masters ! 

THE COUNTRY SAVED. 

In the Wheeling City Council February 12, N'athan 
Wilkinson introduced a preamble and resolutions (which 
were adopted) setting forth the circumstances of Mr. Gos- 
horn's recovery of his slave; setting forth also that the 
Council of Wheeling deemed it "proper to make special 
acknowledgment of an instance of fidelity to the consti- 
tutional obligations of the N'orth in the conduct of North- 
ern citizens and officers, to the end that harmony among 
the States may be fostered ;" referring to the circumstance 
th.^ on the return trip of the Messrs. Goshorn with the 
recovered chattel they "received prompt and efficient aid, 
according to the Constitution and laws and to the duty of 
comity between citizens of different States of the Union, 
and especially that of Matthew F. Johuoon, the marshal, 
and W. C. Cleland, conductor on the Cleveland & Pitts- 
burgh Eailroad, who exerted themselves with intelligence, 
vigilance and courage to baffle the operations of all oppo- 
nents and to secure the return of said fugitive to Vir- 
ginia ;" for all of which "the thanks of the city of Wheel- 
ing" were tendered to these gentlemen "and to all other 
citizens of Ohio who have in like manner given proofs of 
their good will towards this State and their fidelity to 
the Constitution which binds the States together." 



138 THE RENDING OF VIEGINIA. 

It appears at one point along the route a crowd of col- 
ored people had assembled to meet the train ; and it being 
apprehended they might attempt a rescue, the train was 
run past the station ; and it was for this eminent display 
of ''courage in baffling" the crowd that the Council felt 
called upon to thank the conductor. 

SILENCE THE PEICE. 

Harriet Martineau relates that at this period every 
public man in the United States with whom she talked 
agreed that silence in regard to slavery was the sole con- 
dition of preserving the Union. Nobody had the courage 
to ask whether the Union were w^orth preserving under 
such conditions. 

It was the period of which Henry George said in his 
open letter to Leo XIII, written in 1891: "Slavery 
seemed stronger in the United States than ever before, 
and the market price of slaves — both working slaves and 
breeding slaves — was higher than it had ever been before, 
for the title of the owner seemed growing more secure. 
In the shade of the hall where the equal rights of men had 
been solemnly proclaimed, the manacled fugitive was 
dragged back to bondage, and on what to American tradi- 
tion was our Marathon of freedom the slave master boasted 
he would yet call the roll of his chattels." 

NET RESULTS. 

The careful student of history will note that despite all 
this exploitation of "fidelity to the Constitution" by a 
Northern city, and despite Mr. Goshorn's eminent services 
in making a case for the South, the secession of Virginia 



AT THE THRESHOLD. 139 

was not stopped nor the Southern insurrection disarmed 
by this rendition ; nor Avas the swift preparation for war in 
progress at Richmond aj^preciably checked. 



Thus after a few momentous days, swifter than the 
weaver's shuttle, filled with growing agitations and anx- 
ieties, we come to the threshold of the historic Conven- 
tion assembled in the ancient capitol at Richmond Feb- 
ruary 13, ISGlj, fated to betray its pledges to the 
people of Virginia ; to deliver them into the hands of the 
Cotton State conspiracy, as Sampson was by his harlot 
delivered to the Philistines, shorn and helpless ; to light 
the torch of a stupendous war, which, with unparalleled 
sacrifice of life and treasure, was to turn the current of 
history on the Western Continent into new channels, and 
to produce consequences far-reaching and incalculable. 



140 



THE BENDING OF VIRGINIA. 




The Capitol, of Olb Vikghnia. 



CHAPTER VI. 

THE VIRGINIA CONVENTION— ITS CAPTURE BY 
THE CONSPIRACY. 

THE UNION VICTORY. 

The Convention thus brought together in midwinter, 
in the midst of an insurrection already embodied, had 
been chosen by a people of whom a large majority were 
opposed to secession. The Secessionists had all voted 
against referring the action of the Convention back to the 
people ; the Unionists had all voted for such reference. 
The result of the election was deemed a great Union vic- 
tory. Some wolves in sheep's clothing had slipped in ; but 
still the Union control of the Convention was considered 
decisive. The choice for president of such a "strong and 
determined Union man" as old John Janney of Loudon,, 
nominated by such another as George W. Summers of 
Kanawha, was assuring. This Convention was the rock 
against wdiich the billows of secession would beat in vain ! 

"will you walk into my parlor ?" 

With his message to the Assembly January 7th, Gov- 
ernor Letcher had transmitted credentials of two ambassa- 
dors from Alabama whom he styled "commissioners to the 
sovereign State of Virginia." Among these budding sov- 
ereignties, ambassadors and commissioners plenipotentiary 
were cheap and abundant. Before the Convention had got 

141 



142 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

fairly organized there was an irruption of these high-flying 
gentlemen from other Southern sovereignties — one each 
from Mississippi, Georgia and South Carolina — who had 
come, like the spider to the fly, to press upon the Con- 
vention the hospitality of the parlor of secession. It was a 
repetition of the stimulation applied to the Assembly. 
But the Convention did not seem so hot for revolt as the 
other body had been. They were not carried off their feet 
by the fervid appeals of the Cotton-State emissaries. First 
impressions of the Convention justified the popular ex- 
pectation. There was an appearance of dignity and steadi- 
ness that augured well. 

WEIGHED IN THE BALANCE. 

There were 152 delegates, of whom in the Presidential 
election the year before 85 had been for Bell, 35 for Doug- 
las and only 32 for Breckenridge. On a superficial view, 
the body was considered "Union" by more than a safe 
majority. But it was not understood then as well as after- 
wards that Bell's candidacy was in the interest of Breck- 
enridge and secession, and by no means all his supporters 
could be counted as supporters of the Union. Besides, 
this estimate did not take into account the new fact that 
men were about to be tried by a new standard. It had 
been easy to be "for for Union" in theory and profession ; 
it remained to be seen how men would endure the test in 
practice. Were they prepared to stand up against friends, 
neighbors and fellow-citizens who were about to draw the 
sword ? One of the surviving secession members recently 
classified the delegates as they stood at the opening as 
"One-fourth for immediate secession, one-fourth for the 



THE KICHMOND CONVENTION. 143 

Union unconditionally, one-half in favor of making a still 
further effort to bring about pacification and avoid dis- 
union if possible." Out of this conditional one-half, 
whose status was to be determined by circumstances, were 
to come the woes of Pandora. It was as true in that Con- 
vention as it ever was in the Bible that those who were 
not for were against. Any middle ground was impossible. 
The truth was like the negative of a photograph: it was 
there, not yet visible, but needed only to be developed. In 
that negative one-half were hidden enough Secessionists, 
when developed in the "dark-chamber" of secret sessions, 
to carry Virginia across the Rubicon. Nobody could be 
counted for the Union if not unconditionally. All others 
were Secessionists under pressure — when the time came ; 
after due pretense of being overcome. 

EEFERENDUM. 

February 20th, a committee reported the vote on the 
question of referring the action of the Convention to the 
people. Including all but sixteen counties the vote was 
announced as showing a majority of 52,857 in favor of 
"Eeference." Yet on the 5th the Enquirer had declared 
that not twenty "submission Unionists" had been elected. 
The next day it raised the number to thirty, and said that 
the "resistence men" had elected over a hundred. At this 
time it looked to the superificial observer as if the Enquirer 
were wide of the mark. 

CONFIDENCE AMONG THE CONSPIEATOKS. 

But while the great body of the Convention were os- 
tentatiously for the Union, the avowed Secessionists were in 
no wise dismayed, and they were busy as moles working 



144 THE EENDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

under ground. By and by, some of the ''Union" members 
began to show the quality of their professions. But before 
particularizing, let us note some almost prophetic words 
which had appeared in the Clarksburg Guard just at the 
opening of the year, before the meeting of the Assembly 
which called the Convention : 

A LIFTED CURTAIN. 

From numerous articles published in the newspapers — evi- 
dently by disunionists — it is believed that a strong effort will 
be made in the approaching session of the Legislature to induce 
that body to authorize the call of a convention for the purpose, 
pretendingly, of determining what course Virginia shall pursue, 
or what position she will assume, in the present alarming state 
of affairs existing in the country; and it is believed that the 
movers of this scheme hope and expect, by the handicraft work- 
manship of their many dextrous and never-tiring wire-workers 
and tricksters, to be enabled in the building up of this conven- 
tion to secure and to mix in its body a majority of members 
favorable to disunion; and then to decide in favor of disunion 
and proceed to make the necessary provision for the appoint- 
ment of vigilance committees and minute-men (another name 
for Jacobin clubs) in every county and magisterial district in the 
State, to be set to work in every corner, and to work openly in 
appearance but secretly as spies; to use all means, whether fair 
or foul, to inflame the public mind, to excite and arouse the 
worst and most depraved portion of the population, like the 
Yancy vigilance committees. And no doubt they expect with 
this machinery to easily drag Virginia into revolution whether 
her people are willing or not, if it can be done in no other way. 

This was written by John J. Davis, of Clarksburg, a 
young lawyer, who was in the May Convention, in the 
June Convention and House of Delegates of the restored 
government, and afterwards in Congress. The attention 
of Mr. Carlile was caught by the article, from which the 



THE RICHMOND CONVENTION. 



145 




John J. Davis. 

foregoing is but a brief extract, and he obtained from the 
editor of the paper, Cyrns Ringler, the name of the writer, 
sought him out and made his acquaintance. The history 
of the Convention shows how well the programme here 
forecast was carried out. 

NO COERCION. 



To understand how the catastrophe involved in the 
secession of Virginia could become possible, we need to 
understand the special conditions which constituted the 
weakness of "Border-State" Unionism, now in Viriginia 
approaching the ordeal of fire. 

Va.— 10 



146 THE KENDI^fG OF VIRGINIA. 

The Unionism of the so-called Border-States was a 
tenderer plant than the variety grown farther north. Con- 
ditions of soil and atmosphere were different ; and there 
had been a system of culture which made the plant less 
hardy than if it had been left to a natural growth. For 
years the educators had been quietly busy, in the press 
and from the hustings, inculcating the dictum that while 
the "Union and the Constitution" must be j)reserved, there 
must under no circumstances be any employment of force 
to that end. It was a sort of political "Christian science." 
There must be no administration of remedies no matter 
how desperate the case. The preachers of this gospel, pro- 
fessing to be Unionists were of the variety that believed in 
the virtues of the "Crittenden compromise ;" that thought 
the rights of the South needed guaranties, and that the 
Border-States were in position to exact them in their char- 
acter of intermediate between the two extremes. 

When the application of Carlile and Willey, senators- 
elect from Restored Virginia, was under discussion in the 
Senate July 13, 1861, Ten Eyck of ITew Jersey asked 
Powell of Kentucky why Kentucky had not come to the 
rescue of the government when the call was made for 75,- 
000 men ? Powell replied that Kentucky believed the call 
was for the "subjugation" of the Southern States. Ken- 
tucky had assumed a position of "neutrality" and he hoped 
would be able to maintain it. Ten Eyck rejoined that, in 
the language of Kentucky's o"\vn son. General Rousseau, 
"neutrality is treason." There could be no neutrality in 
such an issue as confronted the country. "Whoever is not 
for the government," he said, "is against it." Douglas' 



THE RICHMOND CONVENTION. 147 

last words at Chicago were: ''There can be no neutrality 
in this war; only patriots or traitors," 

Mr. Lincoln let the light of truth into this border- 
State fallacy in his message to Congress in July, 1861 : 

In the Border States, so-called — the Middle States— there are 
those who favor a policy which they call armed neutrality; that 
is the arming of those States to prevent the Union forces pass- 
ing one way or the Disunion the other over their soil. This 
would be disunion completed. Figuratively speaking, it would 
be the building of an impassable wall along the line of separa- 
tion; and yet not quite an impassable one, for under the guise 
of neutrality it would tie the hands of the Union men and freely 
pass supplies from among them to the insurrectionists which it 
could not do as an open enemy. It would do for the Disunion- 
ists that which of all things they most desire — feed them well 
and give them disunion without a struggle of their own. 

Under all this protest against "coercion" and this pre- 
tense of neutrality on the part of the Border-State "Union" 
men' it was continually assumed that the claim of the State 
to the citizen's "allegiance" took precedence over that of 
the United States; and there was a tacit assumption also 
that the general government was, in some sort, an aggressor 
and trespasser on the "reserved rights" of the States ; con- 
stituting a grievance and conceding ground claimed by the 
Secessionists. But none attempted to define, in the words 
of Jackson, "the acts so plainly unconstitutional and so 
intolerably oppressive to them" as to justify the theory of 
government oppression. 

. Thus had the ground been prepared in Virginia to 
make it easy "to mix in" the Convention enough "no- 
coercion" Unionists to fatally "dope" that body when 
the crisis preparing for them had to be met. 



148 THE RENDIISrG OF VIRGINIA. 

In this matter of "coercion" the Richmond conspirators 
v;ere careful not to take their own medicine. They did not 
hesitate a moment to coerce the people of Virginia into 
the Southern Confederacy the instant their plot was ripe 
for it. Even the President of the United States, with one 
foot in the grave and the other on the brink of infamy, 
could find no warrant in the Constitution for the "coercion 
of a State." He could have found abundant warrant for 
the coercion of rebels within a State if he had wanted to. 
His attitude receives possible explanation from the fact 
(stated by McPherson) that after his death a lot of Con- 
federate bonds were found among his papers. 

GOING WITH THE STATE. 

Standing alone, the bald fallacy of "State sovereigTity" 
could not have captured Virginia or her Convention, for 
the large preponderance of sentiment in the State was 
against it. It was the false standard of State pride to 
which the plea of "no coercion" successfully appealed ; and 
it was not every man who could find courage to reject the 
dogma that he must "go with his State." Virginia Whigs 
had long been the followers of Henry Clay, who in the 
memorable debate over compromise measures in 1850 said: 

If Kentucky to-morrow unfurls the banner of resistance un- 
justly. I will never fight under that banner. I owe a paramount 
allegiance to the whole Union: a subordinate one to my own 
State. When my State has cause for resistance. I will share her 
fortunes; but if she summons me to support her in any cause 
which is unjust against the Union, never will I engage with her 
in such a cause. 



THE RICHMOND CONVENTIOiSr. 149 

This had been the doctrine of Whigs in Virginia ; but 
the insidious missionary work of the "no-coercion" propa- 
gandists had seduced large numbers of them from this atti- 
tude and prepared them to abandon it in the emergency 
the conspiracy was planning to produce. 

TRAPPED. 

That half of the Convention who were "Union" on 
conditions had drawn the line at measures of coercion ; 
and it was this that paralyzed their loyalty when the crisis 
came. On the call for troops, they "gave way," as ex- 
pressed by Mr. Summers in his Wheeling speech. It was 
this which brought old John Janney down from the chair 
to confirm with his signature the fatal ordinance which 
lighted the fires of the rebellion and to congratulate and 
commend Lee, w^ho had been appointed to head the forces 
of revolt against that Union which had educated him, 
whose bread he had eaten, whose oath he violated, whose 
sword he dishonored in accepting the commission of re- 
bellion. To this inexorable end were brought all who 
accepted the dictum that the government must not employ 
force to preserve its life. The woman who deliberates is 
not more surely lost than was the Unionist who in that 
day committed himself to the doctrine of no-coercion. 

PAR NOBILE FRATRUM. 

In this Convention the Northwest was especially dis- 
graced by two members. One was Samuel Woods, of Bar- 
bour, who was the first of the "Union" delegates to show 
the cloven foot. Only eight days after the assembling, he 



]50 THE REXDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

offered resolutions declaring that tlie allegiance of the citi- 
zen to his State was paramount ; that Virginia recogTiized 
no right of coercion, that "any attempt to coerce was a 
declaration of war." The other was Leonard S. Hall, of 
Wetzel, who, the same day, moved to instruct the Com- 
mittee on Federal Relations to report the constitution of 
the Confederate States as Virginia's ultimatum. When 
Woods had offered his no-coercion resolutions, he was eulo- 
gized bv Wise, who was encouraged thereby to regard the 
Xorthwest as sounder than some were willing to believe. 
Hall was afraid it was not so sound as Governor Wise sup- 
posed. He himself was the only man in all that section 
who had been elected on the Crittenden proposition. There 
was, he assured them, no sounder States-rights people upon 
the face of the earth than the people of Wetzel. He pro- 
ceeded to say he believed the State had a right to secede; 
that the Constitution was nothing more than a treaty be- 
tween sovereignties. He was willing to present an ulti- 
matum to run to the first of July, and "if Virginia is to 
go, let her go and take the Constitution with her." 

A letter from Wetzel received in Richmond stated that 
nine out of ten who had voted for Hall supposed him a 
"good Union man," and considered themselves sold to the 
South through the influence of Charles W. Russell, who 
was recognized as Hall's political mentor. Mr. Porter, 
of Hancock, after his return from the Convention, said 
that "to have any influence in Richmond a man must talk 
and act like Hall of Wetzel, who said the people of Wetzel 
were in favor of the dissolution of the Union 'because there 
was an irrepressible conflict between free and slave labor.* 



THE RICHMOND CONVENTION. 151 

!N'ow, there were just seven slaves all told in Wetzel Coun- 
ty ; but for this specimen of philosophic statesmanship the 
Richmond folks presented Hall a gold-headed cane. It 
was inscribed : Tresented to L. S. Hall, of Wetzel, for his 
vindication of the honor of Virginia.' " 

Mr. Woods, while emulating Hall's example of sub- 
servience to secession, seems to have been a man of more 
sense, with also a greater capacity for evil. He was the 
first signer of the secret circular sent out to the "Jacobin 
Clubs," or "minute men," summoning the mob to Rich- 
mond to overawe the Convention when they were getting 
ready to force the passage of the ordinance of secession. 
Concerning this man Woods, a correspondent of the In- 
dianapolis Journal wrote from Phillippa in December, 
1861: 

At this place lived the notorious Woods, who was elected 
as a Union delegate to the Richmond Convention and there, it 
is said, was the first to move for secession; and when he re- 
turned made a speech to the people, and especially to the women, 
giving utterance to the basest falsehoods concerning the designs 
of the Northern Army upon the defenseless. And when the 
Federal cannon, on the 2nd of June I believe it was, from an 
adjacent hill poured their thundering missiles upon the rebel 
army then in town, he _leaped upon his horse and with the 
armed rebels scampered away. On his starting, his wife alarmed 
by his reports concerning the Northerners, asked what she 
should do? "O," he said, "I guess they will not molest you." 
And strange to say, she and her children have remained in the 
vicinity until the present time, unmolested! 

A correspondent of the Wheeling Intelligencer, writ- 
ing in June, 1861, says that when Woods ran away from 
Phillippa, he carried with him the assets of the Bank of 
Phillippa, "leaving only the vault behind." This writer 



152 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

says Woods went to Eichmond as a Union man, elected 
over an avowed Secessionist, although the circular he ad- 
dressed to the people of Barbour was "covert disunion 
masked in the livery of heaven." 

A LOOKER ON IN VIENNA. 

The editor of the Intelligencer, Mr. Campbell, spent 
some time in Richmond as a "looker on in Vienna." Hall, 
of Wetzel, had caught his attention and had received some 
notice, more polite than flattering, in letters to his paper. 
He had said the member from Wetzel was misrepresenting 
his people in the demonstrations he was making in favor 
of secession. Hall, eager to make the most of any kind of 
notice however unflattering, was so inflated with this he 
got up in the Convention for a personal explanation. In 
the course of it he said Clemens and Hubbard, of Ohio 
County, had been elected on a platform dictated by the 
editor of the "Intelliger." This brought the Hon. Sher- 
rard to his feet with a fine show of indignation over Hall's 
imputation that he was "disloyal to the institutions of 
Virginia." Hubbard followed in a similar vein, quoting 
his address prior to the election. He had come to the 
Convention "as a Virginian — a Virginian from the Chesa- 
peake to the Ohio — a Virginian on both sides of the James 
River." This was the correct thing for politicians in Vir- 
ginia to do at that time. If one did not want to be "sus- 
pect" (as they used to say in France under Robespierre) 
he must on all fitting occasions avow his loyalty to Vir- 
ginia and its negro institution. It is a surprise that so 



THE RICHMOND CONVENTION. 153 

good a man as Chester Hubbard should have evinced this 
sensitiveness, but Clemens' disclaimer was quite in keep- 
ing with his usual political attitude. 

NOETHWESTERN DEVOTION TO RICHMOND. 

Willey was even more solicitous about Eastern appro- 
bation than most of his Western colleagues. Following 
the speech made by Hall, of Wetzel, March 21st, vindicat- 
ing the people of Wetzel against the suspicion of "dis- 
loyalty to Virginia," Mr. Willey got the floor and ad- 
dressed the Convention at some length in vindication of 
the Northwest generally against "intimations and insinua- 
tions prejudicial to the character of that section for her 
loyalty to the institutions of Virginia — going to credit 
the idea that there is a want of loyalty in the IsTorthwestern 
section of the State to the institutions of the State — all 
our institutions." Towards the conclusion of his remarks, 
Mr. Willey put the j^orthwest into the attitude described 
in the following passage.: 

When the last resort must come — when the proper appeal 
to the law and the constitution has failed to redress the griev- 
ances of the East — when her oppressions are intolerable — I tell 
you the Northwest will send you 10,000 men, with hearts as 
brave and arms as strong as ever bore the banner of freemen; 
and they will rally to her support and seize by violence, if you 
see proper to call it so, or rescue by revolution, what we could 
not get by means of law. We are with the gentleman from 
Princess Anne (Wise) in that regard. We do not always under- 
stand what is meant by the right of secession, we do not under- 
stand what is meant by the right of revolution, but when the 
proper cause arises there are men in West Virginia who will 
stand by the right to the last extremity. 



154 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA, 



THE ROSES FADE. 



It is interesting, in view of later events, to note through 
Editor Campbell's letters the roseate glow of early confi- 
dence in the Unionism of the Convention, and how that 
glow faded away later into soberer and finally somber col- 
ors. He wrote the day after the Convention met, referring 
to certain avowed Secessionists in the East : ''They see now 
pretty plainly that there is going to be no secession of this 
State. * * * And, more than all, they see that the 
Western members are resolving that the State shall not be 
put to all the expense of this Convention without knowing 
where it and kindred expenses are to come from. It is in 
the air that the grand move so long talked of for an ad 
valorem tax is going to be made. This, as General Jack- 
son, of Wood, says, will be turning the Convention to ac- 
count, and, if the point is gained, will relieve the West of 
nearly one million dollars in taxation which she now has 
to pay more than she ought. * * * "Certainly," said 
one of the l^orthwestern members about it, the East does 
not expect that we of the West are going to have our 
heart's-blood wrung out of us by such taxation. * * * 
Indeed, it is the common subject of remark, and I have 
heard it a dozen times this day, that since the West was a 
West she has never evinced a tithe of the backbone which 
she does now." 

Further along. Editor Campbell is "glad to hear that 
Ben. Wilson, of Harrison^ and our old friend Alpheus F. 
Haymond, are right upon the vital question of Western 
interests and also upon the grand anti-secession resolve. 
I hear members also speak encouragingly of L. S. Hall." 



THE lUCIIMOND CONVENTION. 155 

Alas, that hopes so fair should prove so false! We 
have already noted the later aspects of the member from 
Wetzel. Only six days after this cheerful outlook was 
penned, we find Benjamin Wilson, of Harrison, elected 
on strong- professions of Unionism, offering the following : 

Resolved, That we, the people of Virginia, in Convention as- 
sembled, do adhere with patriotic devotion to the Union of these 
States, and that we will do so as long as the same can be pei'- 
petuated consistently witli full security of all our constitutional 
rights and the maintenance of the equality of all the States. 

Resolved, That it is inexpedient and improper for the gen- 
eral government to increase its forces at the forts and arsenals 
and dock-yards within the limits of Virginia, or to do any act 
looking to warlike preparations against the State. 

It may be noted here as well as later that Mr. Wilson,, 
while favoring secession, lacked the courage to vote for the 
ordinance, and was excused from voting on his own re- 
quest. But he voted at home for the ratification of the 
ordinance, and made so little concealment of his secession 
sentiments that in June, 1861, he was arrested by the mili- 
tary authorities, along with James M. Jackson and others, 
at Clarksburg. 

Mr. Haymond soon gave himself conspicuously to 
bringing forward declarations on the subject of ad valorem 
taxation. This gave him the appearance of looking vigi- 
lantly after Western interests. While he and other West- 
ern members were entertaining their constituents with 
this talk about amending the^ constitution so as to correct 
some of the iniquities from which the West had always 
suffered, the secession conspirators were busy as moles with 
the real business of the Convention, burrowing under the 
foundations of Virginia Unionism, getting ready to topple 



156 THE REXDING OF VIRGINIA. 

the whole structure into the abyss of the Confederacy — 
which being done, what would it avail whether taxation 
were ad valorem or on the old basis ? 

SYMPTOMATIC. 

Let us note here a few symptoms of the temper of the 
Convention as manifested from time to time. February 
20, numerous resolutions were introduced generally ex- 
pressing attachment to the Union, but denouncing "coer- 
cion." Six days later Mr. Goggin, while denying the right 
of secession, admitted a revolutionary remedy, and said 
v.-herever Virginia went he was "with her." March 2d 
Mr. Goode, of Bedford, offered a resolution reciting that 
the powers delegated to the general government had been 
perverted to the injury of Virginia ; and as the Crittenden 
resolutions had been rejected by the North, every consid- 
eration required Virginia to secede. March 5th, Mr. Har- 
vie offered a resolution requesting the Legislature to make 
appropriations to resist the attempt of the Federal authori- 
ties to enforce the laws in the seceded States. 

LOOKS SERIOUS. 

But the first real shock to the complacency of the Union 
men in and about the Convention came from a resolution 
offered by Flournoy — Know-Nothing candidate for Gov- 
ernor against Wise in 1855. It was as follows : 

Resolved, That whilst Virginia has a high appreciation of 
the blessings of the Union, and would do much and forbear much 
to perpetuate them, yet it feels itself bound to declare that an 
identity of interest and wrongs with the seceded States of the 



THE RICHMOND CONVENTION, 157 

South would, in case of an attempted coercion by the Federal 
government, demand and receive the interposition of all her 
military strength in resisting such aggression. 

This went to the Committee on Federal Relations ; 
and Mr. Willey, of that committee, confided to Editor 
Campbell that matters in the committee were not encour- 
aging, and that the Flournoy resolution had given the com- 
mittee a somber view of possible danger. 

THE SECESSION MACHINE, 

The chief instrumentality in the Convention for be- 
fogging the "no-coercion" Union members and committing 
them to secession was the Committee on Federal Relations, 
upon which the Unionists had been allowed by President 
Janney only seven members out of the twenty-one. On 
this committee the West had only four : William Mc- 
Comas, of Cabell ; Samuel Price, of Greenbrier ; Wait- 
man T. Willey, of Monongalia, and John J. Jackson, of 
Wood. This committee undertook to name and shape con- 
ditions upon which Virginia would remain in the Union. 
In its composition, through some inexplicable means, Pres- 
ident Janney had been led to compose it wholly in the in- 
terest of secession. It was but one instance of many — 
though an amazing one — in which the half-hearted Union- 
ists of the Convention permitted their adversaries to seize 
and control the machinery of the Convention. The condi- 
tions formulated by this committee for the restraint of the 
United States government were, of course, impossible con- 
ditions, and were intended so to be ; yet conditions which, 
once aspented to by a member and rejected by the Federal 



158 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

authorities, drove him to the logical alternative of support- 
ing secession. This was the study and purpose of the 
conspiracy; and the propositions brought forward by this 
committee were exploited and discussed day after day with 
the two-fold purpose of confusing and inoculating mem- 
bers known to be vulnerable and of occupying the time 
till the progress of events and the consummation of plans 
should bring them to the crisis when the conspirators were 
ready to strike. This committee brought in a report March 
Vilh. — rather three reports. The majority embodied the 
suggestion that the eight slave-holding States which had 
not yet seceded be requested to appoint commissioners to 
a conference to be held at Frankfort, Kentucky, in ]\ray ; 
and appended was a proposed amendment to the national 
Constitution covering the substance of the points agreed 
on by the Peace Conference. Messrs. Harvey, Montague 
and Williams reported in favor of immediate secession. 
The Convention was not ready for this. Mr. Wise dis- 
sented from both reports, differing from the majority in 
details but looking in the same direction. But none of the 
propositions received the assent of the Convention. It was 
not expected they would. They were but time-servers. 

A SIGNIFICANT VOTE. 

One of the declarations reported by the committee will 
illustrate their character and purpose. It was declared 
that the people of Virginia would "expect, as an indis- 
pensable condition that a pacific policy be adopted towards 
the seceded States, and that no attempt be made to subject 
them to the Federal authority, nor to reinforce the forts 
now in possession of the military forces of the United 



THE KICHMOND CONVEXTIO]N'. 159 

States, or recapture forts, arsenals or other property of 
the United States within their limits, nor to exact the 
payment of imposts upon their commerce." 

Mr. Carlile moved to strike out the language quoted. 
His motion received but 17 votes out of 121 cast. This 
motion covered the whole vital issue, and the vote showed 
that Virginia was lost to the Union. It is difficult to see 
how any one could mistake the significance of this expres- 
sion and suppose after that there was a Union majority in 
that body on which any dependence could be placed. Those 
who voted for Mr. Carlile's motion were : Brown, Burdett, 
Burley, Carlile, Carter, Conrad, Dent, Early, Hubbard, 
John ]Sr. Hughes, Lewis, Moore, Patrick, Porter, Sharp, 
C. J. Stuart and Tarr. Willey and Alph. Haymond voted 
against. 

It appears that early in the session Mr. Carlile fell in 
with the outcry against the right of the government to 
* 'coerce" a State, whether in earnest or from politic mo- 
tives is not clear. February 16th he offered a resolution 
declaring that since the decision of the Supreme Court in 
the case of Chisholm vs. the State of Georgia, and the 
adoption of the Xlth amendment, he was ''at a loss to 
understand how the impression that the Federal govern- 
ment possesses power to coerce a State had obtained cred- 
ence." But Carlile was loyal at heart and recognized the 
right of tlie government to enforce its laws everywhere. 
In a speech delivered March 7th, he declared it had the 
right to collect the duties in the seceded States as in all 
others ; and the motion just noticed, to strike out of the 
Federal Relations report a contrary declaration, confirms 
this attitude. 



160 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 



PROPOSES TO RESUME. 



March 27th the committee brought in a substitute for 
their first report, proposing that the constitutional amend- 
ment should be submitted to the States for ratification or 
rejection ; and if not ratified before the first "Monday of 
October following, Virginia should then "resume" her 
sovereignty. This proposition to hang a threat over the 
country made even less impression. The element that had 
taken direction of the Convention did not look to any 
schemes involving such long delays. Like the member 
from Isle of Wight in the Assembly, they were for 
"action" just as quick as they could prepare to precipitate 
it. The discussion on the committee's report went on for 
several weeks, and served its purpose in occupying the 
time and in preparing members for more energetic action. 

In the discussion of the ninth resolution of the report 
April 6th, Mr. Bouldin offered a substitute declaring the 
independence of the seceded States should be acknowledged 
without delay. This was rejected by only three majority ; 
but on the 9th Wise offered a substitute for the tenth reso- 
lution to the eifect that Virginia recognizes the indepen- 
dence of the seceded States, and this was adopted by 128 
to 20. 

THE FEVER RISES. 

After the inauguration of President Lincoln, the ex- 
citement in and around the Convention increased like a 
fever as the night draws nigh. The crisis was approaching 
and events setting towards the catastrophe with accelerated 
speed. The galleries of the Convention were daily crowded 



THE RICHMOND CONVENTION. 161 

and popular demonstrations in the streets, intended to 
exert pressure on the Convention, increased in numbers 
and energy. 

THE MOB GIVES VOICE. 

Keferring to Carlile's speech of March 7th, for which 
he was hissed as he was leaving the Convention accom- 
panied by two ladies, Marshall M. Dent, member from 
Monongalia, wrote to his paper, the Morgantown Star, 
that the speech "struck the secessionists like a thunderbolt 
and was decidedly the boldest effort of the session." Mr. 
Dent adds the following incident as showing the temper of 
the Richmond populace even at that time : 

This afternoon a crowd assembled at the old market and 
taking down a Union flag which had been floating there for many- 
days, hoisted in its stead, amidst the cheers of the crowd, the 
rattlesnake flag. Speeches were made by several persons, among 
whom was Charles Irving, Mr. Clemens' second in the duel with 
"Wise. In the course of his remarks Irving impressed upon the 
people that resistance was not enough; that the true policy was 
to drive the Convention out of the city at the point of the bayonet. 
Scarcely had Mr. Irving uttered these words when the crowd 
shouted "That's right! That's right! Drive them out!" and these 
cries were followed by deafening cheers. 

About this time it was reported that O. Jennings Wise 
had told a member of the Convention that if they did not 
pass an ordinance of secession they ought to be driven from 
the hall at the point of the bayonet. Hon. William G. 
Brown, member from Preston, offered resolutions to re- 
quest the Virginia senators to resign. Next morning he 
was abused by the Richmond Examiner and denounced as 
a relative of "old John Brown." 

Va.-ll 



162 THE KENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

THROWS OFF THE MASK. 

Conspiracy, which the poet feigned is ashamed even to 
"show its dangerous brow by night, when evils are most 
free," now threw off all disgiiises and came out into open 
day. The junta engaged a public hall (Metropolitan 
Hall), and held daily sessions, though under lock and key, 
organizing means of intimidating the Convention and 
forcing it to obey their will. John F. Lewis, in his testi- 
niony before the Joint Committee on Reconstruction (else- 
where quoted), makes this mention of this lawless body: 

At the same time a party of Secessionists met together at 
Richmond — a self -constituted convention — for the purpose of 
forcing this Convention to pass an ordinance of secession or of 
turning them out of doors and deposing Governor Letcher. And 
I believe that if it had not been for the fear of that body the 
ordinance of secession could not have been passed. A large por- 
tion of the people of Virginia at that time were utterly opposed 
to the passage of an ordinance of secession. 

John Goode, a member of the Convention from Bed- 
ford County, who became Solicitor General of the United 
States government under President Cleveland, printed in 
the Washington, D. C, Conservative Magazine, in its issue 
for February, 1900, a review of the history of this Vir- 
ginia Convention. In the course of his article he makes 
the following reference to these conspirators sitting in 
Metropolitan Hall: 

For several days prior to the action of the Convention on 
the 17th, there had been a convention of the people in session at 
Metropolitan Hall, in the city of Richmond. They had come 
from all parts of the State to make known the public demand 
for decisive action without further delay. 



THE KICHMOND CONVENTION. 1G3 

The nature of this "public demand" receives illustra- 
tion from the following secret circular sent out from Rich- 
mond early in April : 

SUMMONING THE MOB. 

Your presence is requested at Richmond on the 16th day of 
April, 1861, to consult with friends of Southern I'ights as to the 
course which Virginia should pursue in the present emergency. 
Please bring with you or send a full delegation of true and re- 
liable men from your county and if convenient aid the same 
object in the surrounding counties. On arrival at Richmond re- 
port to . 

Samuel Woods, Barbour. 

John R. Chambliss, Greenville. 

Charles F. Collier, Petersburg. 

John A. Harman, Augusta. 

Henry A. Wise, Princess Anne. 

John T. Anderson, Botetourt. 

William F. Gordon, Albemarle. 

Thos. Jeff. Randolph, Albemarle. 

James W. Sheffey, Smyth. 

Woods was the only Western member who had the 
hardihood to father this call upon the mob. Gordon was 
Clerk of the House of Delegates. The time fixed was the 
day before that on which the ordinance was finally passed. 
A militia muster had been appointed for the same day as 
a part of the programme for terrorizing the Convention. 
Wise, the violent, is one of the sigTiers of this paper, as 
befits him. 

CORRUPTING THE CONVENTION. 

For some time the conspiracy had been making swift 
progress. A correspondent wrote the Philadelphia Press 
from Washington the latter days of March that the seces- 
sion conspirators had sent agents all through Virginia to 



164 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

promote secession ; that every kind of offer had been made 
to leading Union men in the Convention to unite in a 
coup d'etat, and "some in whom great confidence had been 
placed have yielded to these inducements." Proffers had 
been made to make l^orfolk the great port of the Southern 
Confederacy; "and an organized plan is undoubtedly on 
foot," added the writer, "to seize Fortress Monroe." It 
was not generally known but early in the year the garrison 
in Fortress Monroe had been reduced to two companies. 
A Washington despatch to a New York paper April 1st 
regarding the Virginia Convention, said : "All informa- 
tion agrees in representing that a decided reaction has 
occurred and that the Union sentiment is rapidly losing 
ground in all parts of the State which have hitherto been 
opposed to the revolutionary movement in any form," 
This was more apparent than real, the appearance being 
created by the gTeat activity of secession emissaries 
throughout the State. 

PRESIDENT LINCOLN TRIES TO GET IN TOUCH. 

Before coming to the culmination, let us notice with 
some particularity an incident connecting with the Con- 
vention so interesting and important that no account of 
that body would be complete without it. This was the 
effort made by President Lincoln to get before the Union 
element in the Convention a proposition that they adjourn 
the Convention and go home, he on his part undertak- 
ing to remove the casus belli in Charleston Harbor by the 
evacuation of Sumter. President Lincoln clearly connect- 
ing the peril of having this Convention in session with the 
peril in Charleston Harbor, ho]Ded to get rid of both at one 
stroke. 



THE EiciiMOXD co:N^vENTiO]sr. 165 

The facts were brought out in the investigation made 
at Washington by the Joint Committee on Reconstruction 
in February, 1866, in the testimony given by John F. 
Lewis, a member of the Convention from Rockingham 
County ; that given by John B. Baklwin, a member from 
Augusta County, and that by John Minor Botts. 

Mr. Lewis was one of the few Unionists in the East 
who never struck their colors. He voted against the or- 
dinance of secession and was the only member east of 
the Alleghenies who did not sign it. He was threatened 
with hanging, and at one time thought the threat might 
be executed. jS^ote what Mr. McGrew says about him in a 
subsequent chapter. 

Baldwin WTut to the Convention as a Union man and 
kept up his professions till the ordinance had passed. He 
then signed it and was given a commission in the Confed- 
erate military service, was sent to the Confederate Con- 
gress, in which he occupied a seat throughout the war and 
at the same time, by special dispensation held a commis- 
sion as Colonel. It will appear in the course of what is 
to be related that he had earned these distinctions. 

"an original union man." 

When he testified, being asked if he was "an original 
L^nion man," he replied: "The most thorough-going I 
ever knew." In the course of his testimony he said he 
had never believed in the right of secession, didn't believe 
in it now ; "always looked upon the whole thing as an ab- 
surdity and humbug. I always believed," he said, "as a 
question of law, right and power, the Government had a 



166 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

right to hang Jeff Davis and me too. I was not a Seces- 
sionist," he added; "I was a rebel." Since when, the 
committee ought to have asked him ? When he was posing 
as such a "thorough-going" Union man ? 

Mr. Botts was one of the Unionists whose Unionism 
would wash ; the quality of his loyalty, like the quality of 
mercy, was "not strained." 

TREACHERY OF GEORGE W. SUMMERS. 

From the testimony of these three appear the follow- 
ing facts. About the beginning of April President Lin- 
coln sent a messenger to George W. Summers to ask him 
to come to Washington as he had an important matter to 
communicate ; requesting him, further, if he could not 
come to send some trustworthy Union man in his place. 
Mr. Lincoln had once been associated with Summers in 
Congress and knew him as perhaps the ablest man in pub- 
lic life in Virginia and as the reputed champion of the 
Union cause in the Convention. Mr. Summers did not 
go ; nor did he make any reply to Mr. Lincoln's message. 

SENDS A TRAITOR TO THE PRESIDENT. 

After some delay he sent John B. Baldwin ; who went 
without any credentials from Summers, reached Washing- 
ton April 4th, presented himself to Mr. Seward as having 
come from Mr. Summers in response to the President's 
message to him; was accompanied by Mr. Seward to the 
White House and introduced in a whisper to President 
Lincoln, who was surrounded by visitors, simply as "Mr. 
Baldwin of the Virginia Convention." The President 



THE KICHMOND CONVENTION. 167 

knowing Mr. Baldwin must have come from Summers and 
not doubting his sympathy with the object sought, received 
him cordially, and taking him into a private apartment 
locked the door against possible intrusion. 

STORY TOLD BY BALDWIN. 

According to Mr. Baldwin's statement, the first thing 
the President said to him was: ''Mr. Baldwin, I am 
afraid you have come too late ; I wish you could have been 
here three or four days ago." Then he said: "Why do 
you not adjourn the Virginia Convention?" "Adjourn 
it ?" said Mr. Baldwin. "How ? Do you mean sine die ?" 
"Yes," said the President, "sine die. Why do you not 
adjourn it ? It is a standing menace to me which embar- 
rasses me very much." Mr. Baldwin did not claim to 
quote the precise language, 

COULDN^T THINK OF IT. 

Mr. Baldwin expressed his surprise. "The Virginia 
Convention," he said, "is in the hands of Union men; we 
have in it a clear and controlling majority of nearly three 
to one ; we are controlling it for conservative results ; we 
can do it with perfect certainty if you will uphold our 
hands by a conservative policy here. I do not understand 
why you want a body thus in the hands of Union men to 
be dispersed, or why you should look upon their sessions 
as in any respect a menace to you ; we regard ourselves 
as co-operating with you in the objects which you profess 
to seek. Besides, if we were to adjourn sine die, leaving 
these questions unsettled, it would place the Union men 



168 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

of Virginia in the attitude of confessing an inability to 
meet the occasion ; the result would be that another Con- 
vention would be called as soon as the Legislature could 
be put through for the purpose, * * * and the Union 
men of Virginia could not with proper self-respect offer 
themselves as members of that Convention, having had the 
full control of one and having adjourned without having 
brought about any sort of settlement of the troubles upon 
us. 

"And, sir, it is but right for me to say one thing to 
you, that the Union men of Virginia, of whom I am one, 
would not be willing to adjourn that Convention until we 
either effect some settlement of this matter or ascertain 
that it cannot be done." 

Mr. Baldwin proceeded expansively to tell the Com- 
mittee what he had said to Mr. Lincoln. The Chairman at 
length asked him what plan he had proposed for such a 
settlement. Mr. Baldwin's plan had been a conciliatory 
proclamation and a call for a National Convention "to 
come together and settle this thing." 

He said the President had "said something about the 
withdrawal of the troops from Sumter on the ground of 
military necessity;" that he had replied that would never 
do, that if he had intended to hold the Fort he ought to 
have strengthened it and made it impregnable ; that to 
hold it in the present condition of the force there was "to 
invite assault." "Go upon higher ground," said Mr. Bald- 
win. "The better ground is to make a concession of an 
asserted right in the interest of peace." * - * "If you 
do not take this course, if there is a gun fired at Sumter— 
I do not care on which side it is fired — as sure as there is a 



THE RICHMOND CONVENTION. 169 

Ood in heaven, the thing is c^one ! Virginia herself, strong 
as the Union majority in the Convention is now, will be 
out in forty-eight hours." * * * "And I wish to say 
to you, Mr. President, with all the solemnity that I can 
possibly summon, that if you intend to do anything to 
settle this matter, you must do it promptly. I think an- 
other fortnight will be too hite." 

All this according to Mr. Baldwin, who seemed to re- 
member voluminously what he had said to the President 
but had a very meager recollection of what the President 
had said to him. 

Being asked if Mr. Lincoln had made "no pledge, no 
offer, no promise of any sort," Mr. Baldwin replied : "I 
was about to state that I have reason to believe that Mr. 
Lincoln has hiniself given an account of this conversation 
which has been understood — but I am sure misunderstood 
— by the persons to whom he talked as giving the repre- 
sentation of it that he had offered to me that if the Vir- 
ginia Convention would adjourn sine die he would with- 
draw the troops from Sumter and Pickens. I am as clear 
in my recollection as it is possible to be under the cir- 
cumstances that he made no such suggestion, as I under- 
stood it, and said nothing from which I could infer it." 
Later Mr. Baldwin was asked this question and gave the 
answer quoted : 

Question. — You think you cannot be mistaken when you say 
that Mr. Lincoln did not assure you in any form that it was his 
purpose to withdraw the garrison from Sumter and Pickens at 
that tim.e? 

Answer. — Of course, I would not be willing to say if I heard 
that Mr. Lincoln had given a different representation of it that 
it was impossible he should have done so. I have no reason to 



170 THE BENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

believe that Mr. Lincoln was a man capable of intentional mis- 
representation in a matter of that sort; therefore, I would not, 
of course, undertake to say that it was impossible he could have 
intended to convey that impression. If I were certified Mr. 
Lincoln had said he intended to give me that impression, I 
should be bound to concede it, although at the same time 1 
would be bound to say that the idea never occurred to me and 
that when I first heard that such an idea had been suggested, I 
was as much surprised as I was ever in my life. 

WHAT LINCOLN TOLD BOTTS. 

April 15, 1866, five days after the examination of Mr. 
Baldwin, Hon. John Minor Botts was examined by the 
Committee. Regarding the Summers-Baldwin episode, he 
stated that April 7, 1861, Sunday, he was in Washington 
and received a note from President Lincoln inviting him 
to call. He spent the evening, from seven to eleven, with 
Mr. Lincoln, and in the course of the conversation the 
President told him of his message to Summers and his 
interview with Baldwin. As Mr. Botts repeated to the 
Committee what Mr. Lincoln had told him, the President's 
first words to Mr. Baldwin were: "Ah, Mr. Baldwin, 
why did you not come here sooner ? I have been waiting 
and expecting some of you gentlemen of the Convention 
to come to me for more than a week past. I had a most 
important proposition to make to joii. I am afraid you 
have come too late. However, I will make the proposition 
now." Mr. Lincoln then recited the situation in Charles- 
ton Harbor — Anderson there with eighty men and provi- 
sions only till a certain date near at hand. He had sent a 
messenger to Governor Pickens asking him to allow Major 
Anderson to buy his marketing in Charleston, or if h^ ob- 
jected to men from Sumter landing, that he would have 



THE RICHMOND COXVEXTION. 171 

marketing sent to the Fort. In this case he would not 
try to provision the Fort ; otherwise he would send an un- 
armed ship with provisions, accompanied by an armed 
fleet, the fleet not to enter the harbor unless the provision 
vessel should be fired on ; but if it were, to enter the 
harbor and protect it, "Now, Mr. Baldwin," said Mr. 
Lincoln, "that fleet is lying in New York Harbor and will 
be ready to sail this afternoon at five o'clock ; and although 
1 fear it is almost too late yet I will submit, any way, 
the proposition I intended when I sent for Mr. Summers. 
Your Convention has been sitting now nearly two months 
and all they have done has been to shake the rod over my 
head. You have recently taken a vote in the Convention 
on the right of secession, which was rejected by 90 to 45, 
a majority of two-thirds, showing the strength of the 
Union party in that Convention ; and if you will go back 
to Richmond and get that majority to adjourn and go home 
witliout passing an ordinance of secession, so anxious am 
I for the preservation of the peace and to save Virginia 
and other border States from going out, I will take the 
responsibility of evacuating Fort Sumter and take the 
chance of negotiating with the Cotton States which have 
already gone out." 

"Well," said Mr. Botts, "how did Mr. Baldwin re- 
ceive that proposition ?" 

Raising his hands, Mr. Lincoln replied: "He would 
not listen to it for a moment ; he hardly treated me with 
civility. He asked me what I meant by an adjournment. 
Did I mean an adjournment sine die ? 'Why, of course, 
Mr. Baldwin, I mean an adjournment sine die. I don't 



172 THE KENDIN^G OF VIRGINIA. 

mean to assume such a responsibility as that of surren- 
dering that Fort to the people of Charleston upon your 
adjournment and then for you to return in a week or ten 
days and pass your ordinance after I have given up the 
Fort.' " 

Mr. Botts felt very much incensed that Mr. Baldwin 
should have rejected such a proposition, and asked if the 
President would authorize him to make that proposition 
to the Union men of the Convention ? He would gaiaran- 
tee with his head that they would adopt it. 

''O," said Mr. Lincoln, ''it is too late ; the fleet has 
sailed and I have no means of communicating with it." 

Mr. Botts then asked if he might mention the cir- 
cumstances for the effect on public opinion in Virginia 
and elsewhere? "Not just now, Botts; later you may," 
replied the President. 

BOTTS TELLS LEWIS. 

Mr. Botts returned to Richmond on the 15th; and on 
the evening of the IGth — his house being a sort of head- 
quarters for the Unionists of his kind — a number of gen- 
tlemen were there, among them John F. Lewis, and to him 
he mentioned, in a rather private way, the circumstances 
of his interview with President Lincoln about Mr. Bald- 
win's visit, Mr. Lincoln's proposition and Mr. Baldv/in's 
rejection of it. He asked Lewis if he had heard anything 
of this. Mr. Lewis was surprised. He said he had not 
heard a word, and did not believe it. "I would not," he 
said, "believe any man that I was not entirely familiar 
with who would charge that Jolni B. Baldwin had taken 



THE RICHMOND CONVENTIOX 



173 



upon himself such a responsibility as to have rejected that 
proposition or to have withheld it from his Union col- 
leagues in the Convention, who would most gladly have 
adopted it; and if you do not object I would like to ask 
Mr. Baldwin about it." 

"So far from my objecting," replied Botts, "I prefer 
that you would ask him, as you have intimated a doubt 
as to the veracity of Mr. Lincoln." 

I^ext morning before Mr. Botts was out of bed, Lewis 
came to his room and told him he had seen Baldwin, who 
had acknowledged to him that the proposition was made, 
and that upon Lewis telling him he felt very much con- 
cerned that he should have taken such a responsibility 
upon himself, Baldwin had said he would like to see Botts 
and make "an explanation on the subject and the reason 
why he had rejected it." Further, Lewis added that Mr. 
Baldwin had consented to come up there with him imme- 
diately after breakfast. 

Soon after Mr. Botts' breakfast, Lewis and Baldwin 
were announced. Mr. Botts went into the front room and 
Mr. Lewis said, in the presence of Mr. Baldwin : "Well, 
Mr. Botts, Mr. Baldwin has come up here to make some 
explanation to you about the circumstances connected with 
his conversation with Mr. Lincoln and why he declined to 
accept the proposition." 

"Well," said Botts, "Mr. Baldwin, is it true that Mr. 
Lincoln did propose to you that if the Convention would 
adjourn and go home without passing an ordinance, he 
would evacuate Fort Sumter?" 

"Yes," said Mr. Baldwin, "he did." 



174 THE EENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

"My God," said Botts, "Why did you reject stich a 
proposition as that ?" 

The only answer Mr. Baldwin made was by taking out 
his watch and saying : "It only wants twenty minutes of 
the hour of meeting of the Convention, when a most im- 
portant vote is to be taken" (which Mr. Botts knew to be 
the vote on the ordinance of secession). "I am obliged to 
be there punctually at the hour and I have not time to 
make the explanation I desire, but I will avail myself of 
the earliest opportunity to make a full explanation of the 
whole of it." 

"From that time to this," adds Mr. Botts, "I have not 
laid my eyes on Mr. Baldwin, nor have I heard any ex- 
planation from him, nor have I had directly any com- 
munication from him." 

Mr. Botts further stated in his testimony that Governor 
Peirpoint, and he thought one other gentleman, whose 
name he could not recall, had told him Mr. Lincoln had 
made the same statements to them as to him regarding 
his interview with Mr. Baldwin. Peirpoint said Mr, Lin- 
coln had told him Baldwin had demanded also the evacua- 
tion of Fortress Monroe. 

LEWIS CONFIRMS BOTTS. 

Mr. Botts' account of this matter is confirmed by the 
testimony of John F. Lewis, taken by the Committee be- 
fore either of the others, on the 7th of February. 

The following is a part of Mr. Lewis' statement : 

I went to the house of John Minor Botts, in Richmond, on 
the 16th of April, 1861, and he informed me he had been in Wash- 
ington a few days before and had had an interview with Mr. 



THE RICHMOISTD CONVENTION. 175 

Lincoln, in which interview Mr. Lincoln informed him that he 
had sent a special messenger to Richmond for George W. Sum- 
mers to come to "Washington; and in the event of his not being 
able to come^ to send some reliable Union man to consult with 
him on important matters. Mr. Summers from some cause or 
other did not go but sent John B. Baldwin, of Augusta County, 
Virginia. Mr. Lincoln informed Mr. Botts that he had made 
this proposition to Colonel Baldwin: that if that Convention 
would adjourn without passing an ordinance of secession, he 
(Mr. Lincoln) would take the responsibility of withdrawing the 
troops from Fort Sumter. Colonel Baldwin declined to accede to 
it, and no such proposition was ever made or communicated to 
the Convention. Next morning, I took Colonel Baldwin to the 
house of Mr. Botts, who told him he was informed such an in- 
terview had taken place. Colonel Baldwin did not deny it. In 
answer to Mr. Botts' question, how in the name of God he could 
take the responsibility of withholding the knowledge of such an 
interview from the Convention. Colonel Baldwin remarked that 
it was then near the hour for the meeting of the Convention, 
and he was compelled to be there, but would see him again. No 
such communication was ever made to the best of my knowledge 
and belief to any large portion even of the members of the Con- 
vention, and a large number of them are to this day ignorant of 
the fact. 

ONLY THEEE MEN IN RICHMOND KNEW. 

Mr. Lewis' colleague in the Convention, who roomed 
with him, was Algernon S. Gray, an intimate friend of 
Baldwin. Mr. Lewis told Botts that the night of the 16th 
of April after his return from Botts' house, he mentioned 
to Mr. Gray Baldwin's visit to the President, the propo- 
sition made to him by Mr. Lincoln and his rejection of it. 
He says Mr. Gray exhibited extraordinary surprise. 
''Where in the world did you get that from ?" he said 
springing out of bed. Mr. Lewis replied that Mr. Botts 
had just returned from Washington where the facts had 



176 THE RENDING OF VIEGINIA. 

been communicated to him by the President, and Botts had 
told him that night. Mr. Gray replied : "I did not suj)- 
pose there were more than three men in the city of Rich- 
mond who knew of it." This could have but one possible 
meaning — that Summers, Baldwin and Gray were the 
three. 

Mr. Lincoln did not communicate the matter to the 
cabinet or the public, doubtless feeling deeply chagrined 
that in taking so great a responsibility he had met with 
treachery and failure. 

PEACE OR WAR? 

Sometime before this the Convention appointed a com- 
mittee to wait on President Lincoln to ask what were his 
intentions toward the seceded States. William Ballard 
Preston, who later offered the ordinance of secession, 
'"Sandy Stuart," who had been an old whig and had tried 
to be a Unionist, and George W. Randolph, who had 
beaten Botts for the Convention and became the Confed- 
erate Secretary of War, were the committeemen. The com- 
mittee were directed to ask the President "to communi- 
cate to this Convention the policy which the authorities of 
the Federal government intend to pursue in regard to 
the Confederate States." The preamble set forth that "the 
uncertainty in the public mind as to the policy the gov- 
ernment intends to pursue towards the seceded States is 
extremely injurious to the commercial and industrial in- 
terests of the country." 

Mr. Carlile, when the resolution was offered, moved 
to insert, as having an equally injurious uncertainty, "the 



THE RICHMOND CONVENTION. 177 

policy the seceded States intend to pursue towards the gen- 
eral government." This was rejected, of course, as was 
also his further motion that a committee be appointed "to 
wait on the seceded States and report to the Convention 
what policy they intend to pursue towards the general gov- 
ernment." In opposing the resolution. General Jackson, of 
Wood, said that "^ 'under no circumstances would he or his 
constituents consent to relinquish the stars and stripes and 
join with South Carolina." This declaration produced 
excitement amongst the conspirators. Montague of Mid- 
dlesex followed, commenting upon ''the singular declara- 
tion of the venerable gentleman from Wood." He called 
iijion Eastern men to take note of it. 

WHAT LINCOLN TOLD THE COMMITTEE. 

The committee presented themselves to Mr. Lincoln the 
day after the firing on Sumter, when they felt confident 
they would get the answer they wanted. It is not strange 
they got it. Mr. Lincoln referred them to his inaugural 
address as the best possible exposition of his purposes. 
"As I said then I now repeat," he told them, " 'The power 
confided to me will be used to hold, occupy and possess 
property and places belonging to the government and to 
collect the duties on imports; but beyond what is neces- 
sary for these objects, there will be no invasion, no use 
• of force against or among the people anywhere.' But, 
he added, "if in the pusuit of a purpose to drive the United 
States authorities from these places (military posts and 
property) an unprovoked assault has been made on Fort 
jSumter, I shall hold myself at liberty to repossess it if I 

Va— 12 



178 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

can and like places which had been seized before the gov- 
ernment was devolved upon me ; and, in any event, I shall 
to the best of my ability, repel force by force." He re- 
affirmed the entire inaugural address ; and with this de- 
cisive answer, the committee went back to Richmond to 
help precipitate secession. 

ORDINANCE OF SECESSION PASSED. 

The day the committee had their interview with the 
President, was issued his proclamation calling for 75,000 
men. This convergence of events furnished what the con- 
spirators had been waiting for. The ordinance of seces- 
sion was introduced, in secret session, the following day. 
It was entitled '^An Ordinance to Repeal the Ratification 
of the Constitution of the United States of America by 
the State of Virginia and to resume all the rights and 
powers granted under the said Constitution." One day 
later, April 17th, still in secret session, the ordinance was 
passed. The body of the ordinance was the following: 

Now, therefore, we, the people of Virginia, do declare and 
ordain that the ordinance adopted by the people of this State in 
convention on the 25 day of June, 1788, whereby the Constitu- 
tion of the United States of America was ratified, and all acts of. 
the General Assembly of this State ratifying and adopting 
amendments to said Constitution, are hereby repealed and ab- 
rogated; that the union between the State of Virginia and the 
other States under the Constitution aforesaid is hereby dis- 
solved, and that the State of Virginia is in the full possession 
and exercise of all the rights of sovereignty which belong to a 
free and independent State. And they do further declare that 
the said Constitution of the United States is iio longer binding 
on any citizen of this State. 



THE RICHMOND CONVENTION. 170 

It was stated by John B. Baldwin, in the testimony 
previously quoted from, that he understood the original 
of this ordinance was then in possession of the govern- 
ment, having been taken at the time Richmond was cap- 
tured in the Spring of 1865. 

The vote on the ordinance of secession, with complete 
list of the convention, will be found in the chapter con- 
tributed by Mr. McGrew. Of the Western members vot- 
ing against the ordinance, Haymond of Marion, Price of 
Greenbrier, and Berlin of Upshur, recanted, went back to 
Richmond and cast their fortunes with the Confederacy. 

A DOOR LEFT OPEN. 

That there might be no question about their right to 
secede from the Confederacy in the (probable) event they 
should want to, the Convention, on the motion of "Sandy" 
Stuart, put into the ordinance ratifying the Confederate 
constitution the following: 

In adopting this constitution, Virginia reserves to herself 
the right to withdraw whenever its powers are perverted to her 
injury, of which she alone shall be the judge. 

THE REIGN OF TERROR. 

Describing the mob violence and terror reigning at 
Richmond just before the passage of the ordinance of se- 
cession, George McC. Porter, member from Hancock 
County, in a speech at Wheeling May 5th, said : 

After the attack on Sumter, the mob in Richmond seized 
the artillery. They ran howling through the streets. They 
broke through the doors of your State house. They tore down 



180 



THE KENDING OF VIRGINIA. 




George McC. Porter. 

the stars and stripes and hoisted in its place the flag of the 
Confederate States. The ordinance of secession was passed. The 
injunction of secresy is upon every member. I can only say 
that it passed — and one thing more, which you doubtless already 
know, that I did not vote for it. I would have suffered this 
right arm to be cut off before I would have signed that ordi- 
nance. 

Speaking of the committee sent to the President to 
demand whether he meant peace or war, Mr. Porter said : 



As the committee left for Washington, Roger A. Pryor left 
for Charleston, where he told the Secessionists they must strike 
a blow and Virginia would go out "in one hour by Shrewsbury 
clock." Pryor knew, and those who appointed the committee 



THE RICHMOND CONVENTION. 181 

knew, that when Sumter was attacked the government would be 
justly incensed and the President would give them an unsatis- 
factory answer. 

Prjor, in his speech at Charleston, said : "Do not dis- 
trust Virginia. * * * J ^yill tell you, gentlemen, what 
will put her in the Southern Confederacy in less than ^an 
hour by Shrewsbury clock' — strike a blow ! The very mo- 
ment that blood is shed, Old Virginia will make common 
cause with her sisters of the South !" 

Chester D. Hubbard, one of the Wheeling members, 
who followed Mr. Porter, said he also witnessed the tear- 
ing down of the flag and other acts of violence. He called 
upon Thomas Sweeney, who had been at Richmond at the 
time and was present, for his testimony to the violence 
described. "The mobs were composed of as scabby a look- 
ing set of roughs as I ever saw in my life," said Mr. 
Sweeney, "and they had things pretty much their own 
Avay." Mr. Sweeney denied that he was a Disunionist. 
He "stood where he had always stood," and denounced the 
usurpation unsparingl3\ 

Ephraim B. Hall, a member of the Convention from 
Marion, spoke to a mass-meeting at Fairmont May 6th. 
Among other things he said : 

The genuine Union men did not constitute more than one- 
third of the Convention. A tremendous outside pressure was 
brought to bear to dragoon us into the measures of the Seces- 
sionists. We -were subjected to all sorts of insults. We were 
hissed at and groaned at. The galleries were brought to bear 
on us whenever any man dared utter a sentiment for the Union. 
Some of us were spit upon. We were told we would be driven 
out at the point of the bayonet. I come before you to-day with 
the Commonwealth's seal upon my mouth. (Cries "Take it 



182 THE RENDING OF VIIJGINIA. 

off!") And when it was found we were not to be driven by 
ordinary means, you know what followed. We were hnaliy 
forced into secret session. I remonstrated, but to no purpose. 
They told us that before the Convention adjourned the injunction 
ofv secrecy would be removed and they would retain a reporter 
and keep an accurate record of the proceedings. They refused 
to remove it. 

At the same mass-meeting, John S. Biirdett, member 
of the Convention from Taylor, was one of the speakers. 
He, too, testified to the mob fury which had assailed the 
members of the Convention who were against secession. 
"When Burdett rose to speak, he was greeted with derisive 
cries of ''John Brown !" He had said in a speech at 
Grafton that Wise was a worse man that John Brown. 
"I would rather be John Brown" he now responded "than 
Benedict Arnold." He told the men who were hooting 
him that they were "blackguards — off the same piece with 
the ruffians who tried the same game at Richmond, where 
there were seventeen hundred assembled to intimidate the 
Convention, not one of whom paid taxes, nor paid his 
board while there. Within an hour," he continued, "after 
the ordinance had passed, a mob of seventeen hundred of 
just such chaps as these were in the capitol grounds. They 
went to the arsenal, got out the cannon and paraded around 
the capitol. We adjourned and went to our boarding- 
houses to get away from the mob. I felt for the first time, 
when I saw them break down the doors of the capitol and 
tear down the flag, how deeply disgraced was the ensign 
of the Xation. A portion of this dirty mob, with a rope 
in their hands, went to the boarding-house of Mr. Car- 
lile." Mr. Burdett had previously written from Rich- 
mond: "Carlile's boarding-house was surrounded last 



THE KICHMOND CONVENTION. 183 

night by a mob, who had with them a rope with which to 
hang him. Thej called for him and were loud in their 
threats of vengeance." 

In reference to the reign of terror in and around the 
Convention at this time, Mr. Willey, member from Monon- 
galia, some years afterward wrote this graphic description 
of the crisis : 

During the progress of the bombardment of Fort Sumter, 
the excitement in Richmond and in the Convention was intense. 
Bonfires and illuminations blazed high in the streets and public 
squares; the national flag was torn from its place over the dome 
of the capitol and trampled under the feet of an infuriated mob. 
Stores and public places were closed and the populace sought 
the streets to give vent to their feelings. Strangers rushed to 
the city from all parts of the State and helped to swell the 
throngs. Many who had come in advance of the call to meet 
on the 16th of April assembled together in a large hall and sat 
with closed doors. No ingress could be obtained to the sessions 
of this mysterious body. The Convention went into secret ses- 
sion. The scenes witnessed within the walls of that room, as 
detailed by members, have no parallel in the annals of ancient 
or modern times. On the morning of the 17th, Mr. Wise, the 
member from Princess Anne, rose in his seat and drawing a large 
Virginia horse-pistol from his bosom laid it before him, and pro- 
ceeded to harangue the body in the most violent and denunci- 
atory manner. He concluded by taking his watch from his 
pocket and, with glaring eyes and bated breath, declared that 
events were now transpiring which caused a hush to come over 
his soul. At such an hour, he said, Harper's Ferry and its 
armory were in possession of Virginia soldiers; at another 
period the Federal navy-yard and property at Norfolk were 
seized by troops of the State. 

It was then that the Union members saw the object of the 
other assemblage, which had sat with closed doors from its be- 
ginning and whose concealed hand, seizing the reins of govern- 
ment, had left them the form without the power to resist. 



184 THE RETNTDING OF VIRGINIA. 

Three months before, a private letter from Richmond, 
written January 14th, had said : 

It is threatened here that unless the Convention to meet 
will act to suit the views of the "Minute Men," the latter will 
seize upon this city and inaugurate a State revolution. 

How these things all come together, like the stones in 
the temple! The "Jacobin clubs" forecast by John J. 
Davis in the Clarhshurg Guard; the "Minute Men" here 
referred to ; the ruffians enrolled in this revolutionary or- 
ganization, summoned from all parts of the State by secret 
circular; John Goode's "convention of the people" sitting 
behind locked doors in the Metropolitan Hall, using the 
State executive as an instrument to precipitate war — dis- 
patching State troops, seizing government property, threat- 
ening and overawang the Convention, sending messengers 
to Charleston to tell Governor Pickens to fire on Sum- 
ter to force the President's hand and compel the Conven- 
tion to act — it is a panorama of conspiracy and violence 
unsurpassed in modern times! 

LEVYING WAR. 

The day following the passage of the ordinance of se- 
cession, the powders in control at Richmond — it does not 
clearly appear whether the orders emanated directly from 
the Governor or from the Jacobin body sitting in Metro- 
politan Hall, who had seized the reins as they were seized 
by the revolutionary sections in Paris in the days of Dan- 
ton and Marat — began war against the United States by 
seizure of Harper's Ferry, of the Federal buildings in 
Richmond, Norfolk and Portsmouth ; by sinking vessel 
in the Elizabeth River to prevent escape of United States 



THE RICHMOND CONVENTION. 185 

ships lying at or near Gosport Navy Yard; and by the 
attempted capture of war and naval material at Gosport. 
An order was next day wired to Wheeling to take posses- 
sion of the United States Custom House there, but was 
not executed. At Harper's Ferry, the garrison destroyed 
nearly all the property which could have served the rebels ; 
at Gosport, millions of material was burned, including 
ships at anchor, to prevent its falling into their hands. 
The spoil at Harper's Ferry was limited to a few thou- 
sand muskets, mostly flint-locks; of which, by Letcher's 
order to General Kenton Harper, 5,000 were sent to the 
rebel ''Plug-Uglies," General Stewart's militia, in Balti- 
more. General Butler captured there several boxes of 
them marked "Arsenal and Armory, Harper's Ferry." 

It was the knowledge that these expeditions were on 
the way which caused a "hush" to come over the "soul" of 
Wise as he stood in the Convention with doors locked 
against the public, a horse-pistol lying before him, timing 
the expeditions, watch in hand, and telling Union members 
that the die was cast. 

The rebel mortification over their failure to secure 
more plunder finds expression in Pollard's "Southern His- 
tory," where this destruction of Government property to 
save it from falling into the hands of its enemies is de- 
nounced as "acts of vandalism." 

LEAGUE WITH THE CONFEDEEACY. 

Under both the act of assembly and the schedule to the 
ordinance of secession, the ordinance was not to take effect 
till submitted and ratified at the polls, May 23d. Yet 



186 THE REXDING OF VIRGINIA. 

seven days after the ordinance was passed, the Conven- 
tion, still in secret session, entered into a league with the 
Confederate States whereby all the purpose and effect of 
the ordinance was accomplished at once. It was a coup 
de main. There was no waiting for popular ratification. 
The terms of the secret league provided that pending the 
adoption of the permanent Confederate constitution — ^that 
is, instantly — the entire military forces and operations 
of Virginia '4n the impending conflict with the United 
States" should be put under control of the President of 
the Confederacy, upon the same footing as if Virginia 
had already become a member of that government. After 
this, with Confederate soldiery in absolute control, insti- 
tuting a reign of terror in three-fourths of the State, the 
form of going through an election on the question of rati- 
fying the ordinance was a mockery. 

ACTS OF WAR. 

John Minor Botts told the Joint Committee on Recon- 
struction, after reciting the overt acts of war — the seizure 
of Harper's Ferry, and of the Federal buildings at Rich- 
mond and l^orfolk, the obstruction of the channel in Eliza- 
beth River, and the introduction of a large number of 
troops from other Southern States, making a general camp- 
ing ground throughout Eastern Virginia, that the con- 
spirators 

FORCING RATIFICATION 

Then very quietly turned to the people, when they had to 
vote on the ordinance, and said: "Now, we are involved in war 
and the rejection of the ordinance will not stop the war; so you 
can vote for the ordinance of secession or against it, as you 
like. But, in the language of the Emperor Napoleon's friends, 



THE RICHMOND CONVENTION, 187 

'we advise you to vote for' it." * * * The people found it 
would be utterly useless and at the same time extremely danger- 
ous for them to exercise the privilege of freemen; and there was 
a general and almost universal acquiescence in what they could 
not prevent. * * * i have never seen the vote, nor have I 
seen anybody who has seen it. I have no doubt that a large 
majority of those who did vote voted for the ordinance; but 
whether that vote constituted a majority of the legal voters of the 
State I have never had any means of ascertaining. I know that 
the vote against it was very small, because the city of Richmond, 
which had given me some 1,700 or 1,800 votes against my com- 
petitor, and could therefore, I suppose, have given some 1,500 
or 1,600 against the ordinance of secession, actually gave only 
two votes against it. To illustrate the farce and mockery of the 
vote taken at that time, I will mention that there were assembled 
at that time a large body of troops at and around Norfolk, 
among them a regiment then commanded by Col. Roger A. 
Pryor. This regiment was composed principally, if not entirely, 
of Union men, and when it was found they were voting against 
the ordinance they were disbanded and not allowed to vote. 

MASONIC COERCION. 

It further illustrates the kinds of pressure exerted 
east of the mountains to force the ratification of the or- 
dinance of secession to give place to the following letter 
published bv ex-Senator James M. Mason : 

Winchester, Virginia, May 16, 1861. 
To the Editor of the Winchester Virginian: 

The question has been frequently put to me. What position 
will Virginia occupy should the ordinance of secession be re- 
jected by the people at the approaching election? And the fre- 
quency of the question may be an excuse for giving publicity to 
the answer. 

The ordinance of secession withdrew the State of Virginia 
from the Union, will all the consequences resulting from the 
separation. It annulled the Constitution and laws of the United 
States within the limit of this State and absolved the citizens of 
Virginia from all obligations of obedience to them. 



188 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

Hence it follows, if this ordinance be rejected by the people, 
the State of Virginia will remain in the Union and the people of 
the State will remain bound by the Constitution of the United 
States, and obedience to the government and laws of the United 
States will be fully and rightfully enforced against them. 

It follows, of course, that in the war now carried on by the 
government of the United States against the seceded States, 
Virginia must immediately change sides, and under the orders 
of that government turn her arms against her Southern sisters. 

From this there can be no escape. As a member of the 
Union, all her resources of men and money will be at once at 
the command of the government of the Union. 

Again: for mutual defence, immediately after the ordinance 
of secession passed, a treaty or "military league" was formed by 
the Convention in the name of the people of Virginia, with the 
"Confederate States" of the South, by which the latter were 
bound to march to the aid of our State against the invasion of 
the Federal government. And we have now in Virginia, at 
Harper's Ferry and at Norfolk, in face of the common foe, 
several thousand of the gallant sons of South Carolina, of 
Alabama,' of Louisiana. Georgia and Mississippi, who hastened 
to fulfill the covenent they made, and are ready and eager to 
lay down their lives, side by side with our sons, in defence of 
the soil of Virginia. 

If the ordinance of secession is rejected, not only will this 
"military league" be annulled, but it will have been made a 
trap to inveigle our generous defenders into the hands of their 
enemies. 

Virginia remaining in the Union, duty and loyalty to her 
obligations to the Union will require that those Southern forces 
shall not be permitted to leave the State, but shall be delivered 
up to the government of the Union; and those who refuse to do 
so will be guilty of treason, and be justly dealt with as traitors. 

Treason against the United States consists as well "in ad- 
hering to its enemies and giving them aid" as in levying war. 

If it be asked, What are those to do who in their consciences 
cannot vote to separate Virginia from the United States? the 
answer is simple and plain. Honor and duty alike require that 
they should not vote on the question; and if they retain such 
opinions, they must leave the State. 



THE RICHMOND CONVENTION. 189 

None can doubt or question the truth of what I have written, 
and none can vote against the ordinance of secession who does 
not thereby (whether ignorantly or otherwise) vote to place 
himself and his State in the position I have indicated. 

J. M. Mason. 

VOTE ON "reference." 

In the paper written by John Goode, before referred to, 
he claims the popular vote on the ratification of the ordi- 
nance was 125,950 for and 20,373 against. ''It is proper 
tc say" Mr. Goode remarks "that the vote in opposition 
was cast principally in the ISTorthwestern counties, whose 
members had voted against the ordinance in the Conven- 
tion and which subsequently formed the new State of West 
Virginia" — the only counties, Mr. Goode might have 
added if he had cared to tell the whole truth, in which 
men dared vote against ratification. Mr. Goode's figures, 
however, appear to be incorrect. The vote as announced 
in the Convention June 25, 1861, was: For ratification, 
128,884 ; against, 32,131. These figures will also be found 
in the American Cyclopedia. This made a total vote of 
161,018; majority, 96,750. It is not probable that these 
are honest figures. The Presidential vote in Virginia the 
previous November had been 167,223. Under the condi- 
tions prevailing, it is impossible to believe so nearly the 
whole vote of the State was cast on the ordinance. The 
conspirators had full control of the returns and could cook 
the result to suit themselves. Up to the time Mr. Botts 
testified, it would seem the figures had not been given out. 
Whatever the vote may have been, it was not, save in those 
western counties within the Union lines, an unconstrained 
expression. In no other part of the State could the voter 



190 THE EENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

afford to vote openly against. He was as effectually muz- 
zled as if he had had a bayonet at his throat, where this 
was not the literal fact. 

After the consummation of that league, nothing that 
was or could have been done by legislative bodies or ex- 
ecutive at Richmond could have a feather's weight in force 
of law. Conspiracy had become insurrection and was in 
the saddle. The day after the league was consummated 
the Convention ratified the constitution of the Confederate 
States and chose five commissioners to the Confederate 
Provisional Congress, among them Gideon Draper Cam- 
den, formerly circuit judge at Clarksburg. 

The members of the Convention who consummated the 
"league" with the Confederacy were : John Tyler, Will- 
iam Ballard Preston, Samuel McDowell Moore, James P. 
Holcombe, James C. Bruce and Lewis E. Harvie. Vice- 
President Stephens was the commissioner for the Con- 
federacy. 

TKOOPS KEFUSED. 

The quota of Virginia under the President's call was 
fi,340. Letcher sent this reply to the requisition : 

I have only to say that the militia of Virginia will not be 
furnished to the powers at Washington for any such use or pur- 
pose as they have in view. Your object is to subjugate the 
Southern States; and a requisition made upon me for such an 
object — an object, in my judgment, not within the purview of the 
act of 1795 — will not be complied with. 

And he added : "You have chosen to inaugurate Civil 
War." 



THE KICHMO^STD CONVENTION. 191 

PEESIDENT^S CALL DID IT. 

Mr. Summers declared at Wheeling in 1863 that it was 
the President's call for troops which was the cause of the 
Virginia secession ; but he did not mention how carefully 
everything had been planned — even with some assistance 
from him — to force the President to issue this call. Said 
Mr. Summers : 

It was not the firing on Sumter that carried Virginia out. 
During the days of that bombardment, and almost every hour, 
the wires bringing us messages from Montgomery — especially 
to Ex-President Tyler from his son, who was acting in some 
official capacity down there — how steady and firm we went on, 
vote after vote, in that convention, under the constant announce- 
ment of this bombardment, its success and final triumph. No 
man did give way — our majority still between thirty and forty 
upon every resolution. The Union men — those elected as Union 
men — who ultimately gave way did not give way upon the 
ground that Fort Sumter had been attacked. They knew full 
well that that attack came from the other side; that it was 
wrong — wholly indefensible. The pretext for the secession was 
the proclamation of President Lincoln, which they chose to an- 
nounce and act upon as a declaration of war. 

Let it be remarked that this hypothetical Union ma- 
jority, of which Mr. Summers speaks, was a delusion and 
a snare. The event showed what it was worth. John B. 
Baldwin, Mr. Summers' intimate and confidential, was a 
fair sample of the material composing it. When Baldwin 
told Mr. Lincoln he had only a fortnight to choose between 
peace and war by evacuating Sumter, he knew what he was 
talking about. Did not Summers, who sent him to Mr. 
Lincoln without consulting with a single LTnion member of 
the Convention, know equally well ? Pryor was sent to 



192 THE KEnCiNG of VIRGINIA. 

Charleston to tell Governor Pickens to fire on the Fort be- 
cause that would force the President to issue his call for 
troops; and this being done, the quasi-Unionists in the 
Convention were committed to vote for secession. "Vir- 
ginia will go out in forty-eight hours," Mr. Baldwin told 
President Lincoln. "Virginia will go out 'in one hour by 
Shrewsbury clock' " said Pryor to the people of Charles- 
ton. 

THE ANTICS OF WISE. 

At Richmond, Henry A. Wise seems to have been the 
head devil. John F. Lewis says Wise was regarded as the 
head of the Secession party there at that time. Yet he 
even then made the pretense of being a Union man, and 
coming to Lewis' desk one day in the Convention he said : 
"You help me save the negro and I will help you to save 
the LTnion." After the surrender of Lee, he wrote a letter 
saying he had been convinced long before the close of the 
war that slavery was an evil, and that if the South had 
been successful he had intended to canvass the State for 
the abolition of slavery! In February, 1866, Wise told 
Col. Orlando Brown, a Massachusetts man, assistant com- 
missioner of the Freedmen's Bureau, then resident in 
Richmond, that he had been "for the Union all through." 
"Had we succeeded," he said, "we w^ould have shown you 
what the LTnion was." Further, he claimed that he had 
never fought for the Confederacy. "I never fought under 
the Confederate flag," he said. "It may have been carried 
in my brigade, but I have gone under the Virginia flag." 
"And," adds Colonel Brown, "he showed me his Virginia 
buttons, which he said he had worn all through the war." 



THE RICHMOND CONVENTION. 193 

ARMING AND DISARMING. 

The significance of events, obscure in the midst of 
them forty years ago, is clearer now in the light of fuller 
information and in the j)erspective of distance. An enor- 
mous plot was known to be working throughout the South, 
with its most important centers at Richmond and Wash- 
ington. Conspirators were in high places in the National 
government, betraying their trusts and using their powers 
and opportunities to plunder and disarm the government 
they meant to destroy. The head of the War Department 
was systematically removing government arms and muni- 
tions from Northern factories and arsenals to arsenals and 
forts in the South. As early as December, 1859, the Sec- 
retary of War .ordered transferred from Springfield and 
Watervliet 105,000 muskets and 10,000 rifles to arsenals 
in South Carolina, Alabama and Louisiana. Between Jan- 
uary 1, 1860, and January 1, 1861, he sold under color 
of law to sundry persons and States as "unsuitable for 
military service," 31,600 muskets. October 20, 1860, he 
ordered 40 columbiads and foitr 32-pounders sent from 
Pittsburgh to an unfinished fort at Ship Island, on the 
coast of Mississippi, and seventy columbiads" and seven 
32-pounders from same arsenal to a fort at Galveston, the 
building of which had scarcely been commenced ! The at- 
tempted removal of these heavy guns from Allegheny Ar- 
senal created intense excitement at Pittsburgh, where a 
monster mass-meeting assembled at call of the Mayor to 
protest against the shipment. Joseph Holt, of Kentucky, 
becoming Secretary of War, the order was countermanded 
before it had been fully executed. The Mobile Advertiser 

Va.-13 



194 



THE KENDING OF VIKGINIA. 




Benjamin Stanton. 



announced that during the year 135,430 muskets had been 
"quietly transferred from the Northern arsenal at Spring- 
field alone to those in Southern States." "We are much 
obliged to Secretary Floyd," says the editor, "for the fore- 
sight he has thus displayed in disarming the North and 
equij)ping the South for this emergency." A report on 
this subject was made in the United States House of Kep- 
resentatives from the Military Committee by Hon. Ben. 
Stanton of Ohio (who spent the closing years of his life 
after the war in West Virginia). The report states that 
the Sardinian government desired to buy from 100,000 to 
250,000 muskets "unsuitable for the military service of 



THE RICHMOND COjSrVENTION. 195 

the United States ;" and that the Secretary of War agreed 
to make the sale, but after accepting the application, with- 
drew from it on plea of a misunderstanding as to the price, 
which Mr, Belknap, the agent, denied and which the Com- 
mittee found no evidence of. Apparently Mr. Floyd had 
found more desirable customers at home. 

JEFF DAVIS TRIES TO HELP. 

The Secretary of War had no authority to issue stand- 
ard arms to the States beyond their pro rata of the current 
appropriation- for the purpose ; but he did in 1860 issue 
to eight Southern States in advance their quotas for 1861. 
Jefferson Davis in January, 1860, introduced in the Sen- 
ate a bill for the sale by the government of arms of stand- 
ard pattern to "States and Territories and for the appoint- 
ment from the ordnance corps of superintendents of armo- 
ries in place of the incumbent civilians. The bill passed 
the Senate by a party vote — the Democrats for, the Re- 
publicans against ; but it failed in the House. If it had 
become a law, the operations of Mr. Floyd would have 
been on a much larger scale. 

MISTAKEN CLEMENCY. 

In recalling these and other incidents of National 
treachery and betrayal of trust, by which the government 
was stripped, disarmed and left "naked to its enemies," 
as preliminary to its destruction, one is constrained to 
doubt the wisdom of that almost maudlin clemency which 
refused to punish these unequaled criminals. Such a 
clemency towards those whose only offence was open and 



196 THE EEXDING OF VIRGINIA. 

honest (though mistaken) rebellion may have been justi- 
fied by the highest political considerations ; but what could 
justify the same magnanimity toward the villians who had 
foresworn themselves and who to the betrayal of ISTational 
trusts had added treason in the highest places in the gov- 
ernment ? 

VIRGINIA GETS A SHARE. 

Virginia was a beneficiary of Secretary Floyd's treach- 
ery, as appears from Governor Letcher's message to the 
rebel Virginia Legislature in December, 1861. In this mes- 
sage Mr. Letcher says that on the 8th of January, 1861, the 
day after the meeting of the Assembly called together by 
him, he was in secret conference with other traitors (the 
word is mine, not his) over the question of seizing Fortress 
Monroe. "It is to be regretted," he observes, "that Fort- 
ress Monroe was not in our possession, that it was not as 
easily captured as the jSTavy Yard and Harper's Ferry. As 
far back as the 8th of January last, I consulted with a 
gentleman whose position enabled him to knoAv the 
strength of that fortress, and whose experience in military 
matters enabled him to form an opinion as to the number 
of men that would be required to capture it. He repre- 
sented it to be one of the strongest fortifications in the 
world, and expressed his doubts whether it could be taken 
unless assailed by water as well as land and simulta- 
neously." 

In another part of the message Mr. Letcher recites his 
operations through Secretary Floyd in the procurement 
of arms from the government, of whom he says he pur- 
chased for the State of Virginia 5,000 muskets, 13 Parrot 



THE RICHMOND CONVENTION. 197 

rifled cannon, and a large quantity of powder. He laments 
that be could not get 10,000 muskets more. "If we could 
have then purchased," he says, "all the arms which we 
desired to obtain, our State would have been in a better 
condition to repel the assaults of the Federal executive." 
The transfer of so many muskets to arsenals farther South 
may explain why there were only 5,000 left for Letcher. 
"For this struggle, so suddenly commenced," comments 
the Governor, "Virginia had for some time been making 
such preparations as her means enabled her to make. Al- 
though she was not so well prepared as was desirable, still 
she was better prepared than most of her Southern sisters 
— better prepared than any of them." "For some time 
anterior to the secession," continues Mr. Letcher, "Vir- 
g-inia had been engaged in the purchase of arms of differ- 
ent kinds, ammunition and other necessary articles, and 
in mounting artillery, in anticipation of the event which 
subsequently occurred." 

What singularly wise prevision ! Yet in his January 
message Governor Letcher had affected to deprecate the 
calling of a Convention. It was a game of secret treachery 
and false pretense all around. Mr. Davis before he made 
his forecast in the Clarksburg paper, must have been 
favored with a glimpse under some lifted curtain of things 
intended only for nocturnal eyes ! 

LETCHEK "the IGNOBLE." 

After reading this avowal of Mr. Letcher's, it is im- 
possible to have any respect for the claim made for him 
that he was a Union man at heart. He told this to Mr. 



198 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

Burdett at his home in Lexington after the war, and Mr. 
Burdett is inclined to give him credit for sincerity; but 
if he had been what he claimed, he never could have played 
the traitorous part he did, much less have boasted of it. 
His own voluntary statements in his message show who 
it was that had "chosen to inaugurate Civil War." The 
New York Times expressed very uncomplimentary opin- 
ions of Mr. Letcher. It described him as "the ignoble;" 
as "false and cowardly," as "despised even among the 
people of Virginia ;" "an abject tool in the hands of the 
usurpers." His own admissions seem to justify this esti- 
-.nate of him. As apparently related to the part Letcher 
was playing at this period, it may be mentioned that Sen- 
ator "Jim" Mason wrote to a friend at Paris as early 
as February 20th, while he still held his seat in the Sen- 
ate: "Arrangements have been made to secure the pass- 
age of an ordinance of secession in Virginia, and Wash- 
ington will be seized at an early day." 

VIRGINIA IN THE LEAD. 

In the light of these disclosures, we see Virginia at 
the opening of 1861, though a large majority of her peo- 
ple were loj^al to the United States, far in advance of all 
I the other insurgent State governments in her preparation 
for the devil's dance of war. Her pretended attitude of 
peace-maker was only the cover for energetic preparations 
for hostilities. She had her "peace" commissioners at 
Washington amusing the country with talk about pacifica- 
tion; and even had the insolence to send a special com- 
mittee to the President to demand of him whether he 
meant peace or war. 



THE RICHMOND CONVENTION. 199 

REWARD OF MERIT. 

Wise said early in the Convention that '^bv all the 
gods" they "should have war." They did have war, to 
repletion. Before Appomattox came around, the appetite 
of the belligerent Mr. Wise and his fellow-conspirators 
who survived was fully sated. The crop they had sown 
to the gale of madness was a little slow in maturing, but 
it ripened at last and was reaped in the whirlwind. The 
punishment of Virginia for unfaithfulness to the teach- 
ings of her earlier statesmen was severe. One of her citi- 
zens, Charles Douglas Gray, of Augusta County, testify- 
ing before the Joint Committee on Reconstruction, being 
asked what was the appearance of the country which had 
been the arena of active operations, described the desola- 
tion in the Shenandoah Valley as folloM's : 

From Harper's Ferry to Newmarket — which is about eighty 
miles — from one mountain to the other, the country was almost 
a desert. There were no fences. Speaking of the condition of 
the valley after General Sheridan retired, I described wheat- 
fields growing without any enclosure. Some one asked me 
whether the stock would not destroy the wheat? I said "Cer- 
tainly, if General Sheridan had not taken the precaution of 
removing all the stock." We could cultivate grain without 
fences, as we had no cattle, hogs, sheep or horses, or anything 
else. The fences were all gone; some of the orchards were very 
much injured; but the fruit trees had not been, as a general 
thing, destroyed. The barns were all burned; a great many of 
the private dwellings were burned; chimneys standing without 
houses, and houses standing without roof, or door, or window. 
A most desolate state of affairs; bridges all destroyed, roads 
badly cut up. Large armies, whether friendly or hostile, are 
devouring animals. The damage was not all done by the Fed- 
erals. The country from Alexandria to the Rapidan suffered 
perhaps as much as the Shenandoah Valley. 



200 THE EEXDING OF VIKGINIA. 

Another citizen of Virginia (Hotchkiss, of Staunton) 
has well summarized in an article in the Encyclopedia 
Brittanica the ruin wrought in Virginia by the w^ar : 

The Civil AVar of 1861-65 was more disastrous in its conse- 
quences to Virginia than to any other State of the Union. From 
first to last, its territory was overrun; hundreds of battles and 
minor engagements took place within its borders, and all the 
destruction incident to gigantic military operations fell upon it. 
Tens of thousands of her best men were killed in battle. Its 
territory was dismembered and a third part of it cut off, while 
more than three hundred million dollars worth of property was 
destroyed in what remained. 



WHEKEIX THE COXVENTIOX FAILED. 

In a last glance at this historic Convention, on whose 
edict turned events as fateful as ever hung on the greatest 
battles of the world, let us try to realize one aspect of it 
which has never anywhere been j)resented. 

It was called at the instance of the conspirators, by 
a legislature thoroughly in sympathy Avith their purpose, 
with a view to throw Virginia into the projected revolu- 
tion. The peo2:)le of Virginia as a whole did not want a 
Convention for this or any other purpose ; and in electing 
delegates, they chose a large majority on pledges against 
secession, by popular majorities aggregating near sixty 
thousand ; and by like majorities voted to limit the powers 
of the Convention so that any dangerous action taken by 
it should be inoperative till ratified by popular vote. 

When the delegates came together, it aj^peared that 
about two-thirds of them were for maintaining the Union. 
Backed by the great preponderance of Union sentiment 



THE RIC^MO^^D COXVEXTION. 201 

among the people of Virginia as expressed in their elec- 
tion, what had we a right to expect from these delegates ? 
The whole secession plot in Virginia had been defeated — 
provided the victory were not thrown away; provided the 
citadel were not basely surrendered. We shoidd have ex- 
pected to see this majority, flushed with victory and feeling 
a high sense of their great opportunity and responsibility, 
jiroceed to organize the Convention in the interest of the 
Union cause against secession ; and this being done, to 
adopt a declaration that inasmuch as the Convention had 
been called for an object to which the people of Virginia 
had declared themselves overwhelmingly opposed, and in- 
asmuch as the Convention, was not wanted for any other 
purpose, the proper and only thing for it to do was to ad- 
journ sine die. ^ This would have ended secession in Vir- 
ginia. If the traitorous legislature had ordered another 
election for another Convention, they would have been 
beaten by a still larger majority. It needed only that the 
Union majority in the Convention should rise in a manly 
way to a realization of their strength and of their duty. 

Instead of this, what do we see ? The minority are al- 
lowed to organize the Convention, to control its machinery 
and shape its proceedings from first to last, in the inter- 
est of secession. An old man is elected President who, 
through either imbecility or treachery, gives fourteen out 
of twenty-one of the Committee on Federal Relations to 
the conspirators. This was the committee which gave 
direction and shape to the whole business of the Conven- 
tion. The minority were permitted to bring in the rebel 
emissaries from the Cotton States to harangue the dele- 
gates and seduce them from their duty if they could. This 



202 THE KEXDING OF VIRGINIA. 

sovereign body representing tlie strength and dignity of the 
people of Virginia, was bullied and threatened by ruffians 
irj its galleries, in the lobbies and in the street. From be- 
ginning to end the conspiring, fire-eating minority, with 
Wise at its head, took the aggressive and employed every 
element of intimidation to dragoon the majority; while 
this gTeat imbecile majority accepted the attitude of apol- 
ogists and were on the defensive from the first. Such 
Union men as Summers and Willey made pleading and 
pathetic speeches against secession, when all they had to 
do to make secession impossible was to muster their ma- 
jority and adjourn the Convention ! We may search the 
records of popular assemblages in vain to find anything so 
fatuous. 

From their first day of victory down to the lamentable 
end, this Union majority, in their pitiable helplessness, 
stood in the Convention like a flock of frightened sheep, 
while the wolves raged around them, every now and then 
snatching one from their ranks, till their case became hope- 
less. At last there was no longer even the counterfeit of 
power to resist; and the helpless Unionists were forced 
into secret session ; where, under intimidation of Wise's 
horse-pistol, of the conspirators in Metropolitan Hall, of 
the mobs in the streets, from distrust of one another, know- 
ing their ranks were honey-combed with treachery — under 
Wise's announcement, too, that war operations had already 
begun — this proud Union majority, sent up to Richmond 
to protect the Commonwealth against the possibility of 
such a catastrophe, made their final surrender ! 

It is a spectacle long to be remembered — long to be 
deplored ; to be explained as best it may. 



CHAPTER Vn. 

THE NORTHWEST CONFRONTS THE CRISIS. 

HEK DELEGATES WITHDRAW. 

The night following the passage of the ordinance of 
secession, Messrs. Hubbard, Clemens, Carlile, Tarr, Dent 
and Burdett, qf the Northwestern members, seeing that 
further resistance in the Convention was impossible, that 
the sooner thej got home and warned their people the bet- 
ter, and that their personal liberty was no longer secure 
in Richmond, quietly took a train for the i^orth and Avere 
in Washington next morning. They had been watched for 
some time, it was said, and were aware of it, but managed 
to give the spies the slip. Had they remained another day 
they were liable to be detained by force as the most effect- 
ive means of crippling the loyal resistance in the N^orth- 
west. Orders were telegraphed by Mr. Letcher to inter- 
cept them at Fredericksburg; but either the order was re- 
ceived too late or for some other reason was not executed. 
Anyhow, Richmond saw them no more ; and the cat being 
out of the bag, it was probably deemed useless to detain 
those who remained behind ; and they who Wished were 

203 



204 THE EENDIiN^G OF VIRGINIA. 

allowed to leave, first obtaining jDermits from the Gov- 
ernor. Here is a copy of the one given to the member 
from Marshall : 

"Pass James Burley, 

"Marshall County, Va.^ 

"Via Orange & Alexandria R. R., 
"(Signed) John Letcher." 

Mr. Burley had been a very resolute Unionist in the 
Convention and had offered some resolutions not exceeded 
in the firmness of their declarations by anything said or 
offered during the session. Mr. McGrew, in a later chap- 
ter of this volume, gives an entertaining account of his 
own escape, as far as Alexandria with others and thence 
to Washington by himself ; and he relates that when he got 
over to the Baltimore & Ohio Station in Washington, the 
first person he saw was "old man Burley" (as he was gen- 
erally called by his familiars), sitting on the platform con- 
tentedly smoking his pipe. The others who had accompa- 
nied Mr. McGrew to Alexandria, not being allowed to pro- 
ceed farther, went across northern Virginia via Winchester 
and found their way home. In a later chapter appears a 
statement from ]\[r. Burdett that Governor Letcher did not 
want the departing members brought back and took care 
that his orders for the arrest of the first party of fugitives 
should be so timed that they should be safely past Fred- 
ericksburg before the telegram reached there. At Wash- 
ington this iDarty scattered. Burdett was the only one 
who went west by the Baltimore & Ohio, and in the chap- 
ter contributed by him he relates some of his experiences 
on the way. Mr. Tarr was accompanied to his home by 



THE KICIIMOND CONVENTION. 



205 




The Wiieei.ixg Custom House. 

Mr. Carlile ; and the two gave an account of matters at 
Richmond to an assemblage in Wellsburg the evening after 
their arrival there. 



A BUZ AT WHEELING. 



Mr. Hubbard reached Wheeling the evening of April 
19th ; and that same evening information was lodged at the 
post-office that orders had been wired by Governor Letcher 



206 THE RENDING OF VIEGINIA, 

to the State military organization there to seize and occupy 
the Federal building. The information was promptly 
put in possession of Mayor Andrew Sweeney and com- 
municated to a few other reliable persons. It was not the 
intention that it should become public; but it did, and the 
news flew like wildfire through the city. In a shor' time 
hundreds of angry and excited men had collected i. the 
streets about the building, armed with guns, piste i- and 
other weapons of offence, to prevent the execution c . such 
an order. Mayor Sweeney addressed the crowd and as- 
sured them that no attempt to seize the building would be 
permitted, and the jDeople were requested to return to their 
homes. Some did so, but others lingered in the vicinity 
for some hours. Gibson L. Cranmer also^ spoke to the 
crowd, from the roof of Busby & Little's wagon-shed, ad- 
joining the Custom House grounds on Market Street. 
There is no reason to doubt that any attempt to carry out. 
Letcher's orders would have been resisted by the people to 
the bloody end ; but a knowledge of the state of popular 
feeling was sufficient to deter the Governor's friends from 
uiaking the mad attempt. If Letcher & Co. at Richmond 
had been well-informed, they never would have given the 
order. Andrew J. Pannell was collector of customs at 
the time, and his well-known secession proclivities gave 
color to the report. The (Secession) Wlieeling Union the 
next day sneered at the precautions taken. The Intelli- 
gencer replied that the information received "was of such 
a kind that it would have been criminal in the person to 
whom it was communicated not to have acted upon it." 

The Richmond Examiner not I0112: afterward took occa- 
sion to make this fline; at the Northwest : 



THE kiciimojs:d conveisttion. 207 

Carlile, the friend of Botts, whom the "ladies of Richmond" 
were announced in newspapers to have presented with a gold 
watch for his labors in the Convention, together with Brown, the 
censor of Hunter and Mason, and Cavalier Clemens, are not 
hanged. They live and work their devil's work in Northwestern 
Virginia, and are the heads of a large party there. They are the 
candidates for the Congress of Lincoln and publicly advocate 
the separation of the Northwest from the rest of the State. 
They inspired that set of ruffians who resisted those orders of 
the State to take possession of the Custom House at Wheeling. 
These orders were obeyed and the colors hoisted over the build- 
ing, only to be pulled down and replaced by the Abolitionist 
stripes which dishonor it still. 

The orders were not obeyed, and the Confederate col- 
ors were not hoisted over the building-, Mr, Letcher's 
officers may have sent back a report of this kind to make 
them appear more valorous than they were. But it is 
clear such orders were actually issued from Richmond. 
At that time those persons in Wheeling who adhered to 
Mr, Letcher and the Confederacy were keeping quiet ; and 
not long after, such of the "Shriver Grays" as felt im- 
pelled to fight for their "rights" slipped away quietly and 
made their way beyond the Confederate lines, 

ORGANIZING THE MILITARY. 

The next evening after Mr, Hubbard's return, a public 
meeting was held at American Hall, in the Fifth Ward, 
where he had his home ; and he was present and gave his 
neighbors some account of his Richmond experiences, but 
respecting the injunction of secrecy and not disclosing the 
fact that an ordinance of secession had been passed. He 
indicated to them what they had to expect and advised 



208 



THE EENDING OF VIRGINIA. 




Chester D. Hubbard. 



the vouiig men to go ahead and organize military com- 
panies. He said a call wonld soon be issued from the 
mountain counties for a convention to form a provisional 
government. He assured them that the Mayor of the city 
was a good Union man and would do his duty in the 
crisis. A day or so later, Mayor Sweeney meeting Mr, 
Hubbard on the street, asked him what they were going to 
do with the military companies they were forming ? '"Keep 
the peace of the city," was the reply. 

From this time on, Wheeling was the center of an in- 
tense though suppressed activity. Conferences betAveen 
Wheeling and other Panhandle delegates, with Carlile and 



THE EICIIMOND CONVENTION. 209 

leading Union citizens of Ohio and other counties, were 
in progress day and night. Ten companies organized as 
the result of Mr. Hubbard's suggestion. They got together 
to organize a regiment and on the 27th of April elected 
Chester D. Hubbard, Colonel ; Dr. Thomas H. Logan, 
Lieut. Colonel ; Andrew Wilson and S. H. Woodward, 
Majors ; James W. Paxton, Adjutant. The organization, 
however, did not get into the L^nited States service in this 
shape. Within the next fortnight were organized the Iron 
Guards, the Rough and Ready Guards, the Henry Clay 
Guards, who were enlisted by Major Oakes, L^nitcd States 
recruiting officer, on Wheeling Island. A company of 
Senior Home Guards, with Robert Hamilton, Captain, 
was also organized and enlisted about this time. 

BURDETT PREFERS JOHN BROW^N. 

At Grafton on the 2Tth, in a public meeting, Mr. Bur- 
dett gave an account of his experiences at Richmond. He 
said the scene in the Convention during the passage of the 
ordinance of secession w^as -more like a funeral than a re- 
assertion of the right of sovereignty. He paid his respects 
to Henry A. Wise, who he said was an "infinitely worse 
man than old John Brown." It was in alhision to this 
remark that the rouglis who interrupted his speech at 
Fairmont May 6th called him ''John Brown," when he 
told them he "would rather be John Brown than Benedict 
Arnold." This appears to have been the first public dis- 
closure of the fact that an ordinance had been passed ; but 
Mr. Burdett says he made up his mind on the way home 
that he should keep "no rebel secrets" from his constitu- 
ents. 

Va.-14 



210 the bending of virginia. 

"sam" woods has an expeeience. 

IN^ot long after the 1st of May, Woods of Barbour came 
home, the Convention having taken a vacation. News of 
his coming preceded him ; and when he descended from the 
train at Grafton he encountered an angry crowd, who 
made a rush for him. He scrambled back on the car and 
begged the conductor to lock the door and pull out from 
the station. Those who accorded him this reception must 
have been some of Peirpoint's "b'hoys," who paid their re- 
spects to Colonel Porterfield when he went to Grafton to 
establish a camp for Letcher, and was permitted to stay 
until the next train left ! 

and LEONARD S. HALL ANOTHER. 

Hall of Wetzel, it was reported, had a kindred ex- 
perience at Parkersburg. He was recognized in the street 
and a crowd got after him and were about to lay violent 
hands on him, when he was rescued by General Jackson, 
who sheltered him in his own house. When Leonard later 
went aboard the steamer Albemarle, to take passage up 
the river to Wetzel, the officers of the boat refused to carry 
him. He had to take a train back on the Northwestern 
Virginia road to a way station and strike out across the 
country. This was rather ignominious ; but he had that 
gold-headed cane to assist his limbs and must have been 
sustained also by the reflection that he had "vindicated 
the honor of Virginia." 



THE RICHMOND CONVENTION. 211 

ORDINANCE PUBLISHED. 

The Rielimond conspirators were reported indignant 
because Carlile and Dent, when passing through Washing- 
ton had called on President Lincoln and revealed to him 
the action taken by the Convention in secret session. The 
conspirators had all been very free to violate their volun- 
tary oaths to support the Constitution of the United States, 
but were shocked that these gentlemen should disregard 
an injunction forced on them when they were powerless 
to resist and report what their first duty as citizens and 
honest men required them to disclose to the United States 
authorities. It seems to have been a mistake in the West- 
ern delegates not to have made the same public disclosure 
immediately on their return home ; though we must re- 
member that in that hour of gloom and uncertainty, when 
all government and authority were rocking beneath men's 
feet, the path of duty and safety was not so clear as it 
seems now. But except for Mr. Burdett's statement at 
Grafton — which did not get wide publicity — it was not 
publicly known in Western Virginia that an ordinance of 
secession had been passed until the fact was announced 
and the ordinance printed in the Baltimore American of 
April 28th, Saturday. It was printed at Wheeling Mon- 
day morning, and Editor Campbell^ of the Intelligencer, 
accompanied the publication with this ringing denuncia- 
tion and appeal for resistance : 

A STIRRING APPEAL. 

Fellow-citizens, language fails us in our desire to put the 
whole height and depth of this stupendous infamy before you. 
Read it, and re-read it, and see what a mockery and scorn has 



212 THE RENDING OF VIEGINIA. 

been made of your decree solemnly recorded by a majority of 
60,000 on the 4th of February last that no ordinance of secession 
should be binding until passed upon and ratified by the people. 
Instead of this, all the power you reserved to yourselves has 
been usurped. More than a week ago, before the ordinance itself 
had leaked out from the dark recesses of that star chamber of 
despotism at Richmond, you were told by the Richmond Enquirer 
that the ordinance was to be submitted, "but simply as a matter 
of form and not of contest." And sure enough it will be but a 
matter of form — a form without substance, essence or life, a 
meaningless, empty and cruel counterfeit, that like the Dead Sea 
apples, will turn to ashes at your touch. Every traitor outside 
the limits of Virginia wherever a camp can be pitched, be he a 
conspirator from South Carolina, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, 
Mississippi, Louisiana or Texas, will ci'owd in and vote. The 
Oxford and McGee candle-box stuffings in Kansas, infamous and 
execrable as they were, will be as child's play to the despotic 
machinery that will be put in motion to pass this ordinance. 
There is no possible chance for it to fail, and it would be of no 
earthly account to the Union men of the State if even in despite 
of all this high-handed treason and usurpation it were voted 
down. The State is in revolution now. The ordinance is worded 
to take effect from its passage. It is as much in effect now as it 
ever will be. Under it our Congressional elections have all been 
abolished. 

By this ordinance every vestige of liberty and franchise — 
every attribute of free citizenship — all that we have held dear as 
freemen — all that we can hope or expect in the future — is blasted 
and blotted out. Unless the strong arms of the government, 
united with our own outstretched hands, can save us, we are 
lost — hopelessly and irretrievably bound hand and foot, and de- 
livered over to the spoilers and traitors, who in their wild fury 
are turning the eastern part of our State into a vast field of 
anarchy. 

Union men of the Northwest! We conjure you as you have 
any manhood — as you have any hope for yourselves or your 
children — in this hour of our deadliest peril — to throw aside and 
trample under foot the last vestige of partyism. Let it be 
blotted out from your remembrance that you have ever been 
dlvideQ as; partisan-s, but keep simply and only before your 



THE EICHMOND CONVENTIOISr. 213 

minds the one great, momentous truth that if you falter or fail 
now your all is gone. Organize and enroll yourselves everywhere 
in Union organizations. Summon every energy of your mind 
and heart and strength, and let the traitors who desecrate our 
borders see, and let history in all after time record it, that there 
was one green spot — one Swiss canton — one Scottish highland 
— one county of Kent — one province of Vendee, where unyielding 
patriotism rallied, and gathered, and stood, and won a noble 
triumph. 

It seems to me now, in reading this long after the peril 
of that crisis is past — so long many have almost forgotten 
it — that it is not easy to find anywhere in patriotic Ameri- 
can literature, even in the words of the greatest Americans, 
a nobler, and under the circumstances a more courageous, 
utterance. 

THE EXCITEMENT SPREADS. 

The withdrawal and return of the ISTorthwestern dele- 
gates and the story they had to tell of rank conspiracy 
and violence at Richmond — which, when the ordinance 
had been published, came out in all its details — excited 
profound indignation and alarm. The agitation quickly 
showed itself in public gatherings and in declarations of 
resistance even to the extremity of setting up an inde- 
pendent State government. With a few exceptions, the 
people did not even yet realize how swTcping yet minute 
were the plans of the revolutionists for forcing ratifica- 
tion, as they had forced secession. A few who understood 
the effect of the military league entered into with the Con- 
federacy gave no more consideration to the question of 
ratification but turned their thoughts to measures of safety. 



214 THE EENDING OF VIEGINIA. 

military and other, forced on the Union element by the 
usurpation. Yet even as late as the May Convention, some 
of the leaders who knew this inside history were found 
urging that the fight against ratification was the most im- 
portant thing before them 

In counties where Union sentiment was strongly pre- 
dominant, the Secessionists were prudently silent, so that 
the public expression in such counties appeared more unan- 
imous than it really was. 

At Morgantown a meeting had been held the night of 
April 17th on a report that the ordinance had been passed, 
and resolutions of the firmest loyalty to the United States, 
written by Ralph L. Berkshire, adopted, concluding with 
a declaration that now the cup of Eastern oppression was 
full, and the West, repudiating further connection with 
their ancient oppressors and refusing to follow them into 
the Confederacy, would remain under the stars and 
stripes. 

At Pruntytown (the home of Burdett and Ellery 
R. Hall) resolutions had been jjassed on the 13th declaring 
that Western Virginia adhered to the United States ; that 
she had no interest in a government established for the 
purpose of propagating slavery; and that if Virginia se- 
ceded they favored the erection of a separate State for the 
West. 

COMING CONVENTION. 

On the morning of April 22d, the Wheeling Intelli- 
gencer posted at the head of its editorial columns a "No- 
tice to the Public," stating that a strong movement was 



THE EICHMOND CONVENTION. 215 

afoot among the counties west of the Alleghenies for a 
general convention to be held in Wheeling early in May 
to consider matters connected with the public safety. The 
editor stated in another place that within two days he had 
received letters from Marshall, Monongalia, Preston, 
Marion, Tyler and Wetzel Counties asking as to the course 
which Union men in Wheeling and throughout the North- 
west generally were going to pursue. 

A GOOD WOED FROM DOUGLAS. 

On the morning of this same day. Senator Douglas of 
Illinois crossed the Ohio at Benwood. He was detained 
several hours at Bellaire, and it was not long until a 
crowd assembled in and around the hotel La Belle to see 
the distinguished Illinois Senator. At length in response 
to persistent calls he went out uj)on the balcony and spoke 
briefly on the l^ational issue. In the course of his address 
Mr. Douglas said : 

We in the northwest of this great valley (the Mississippi) 
can never recognize either the propriety or the right of States 
bordering along the Gulf of Mexico, upon the Atlantic Ocean, 
or upon the Pacific, to separate from the Union of our fathers 
and establish and erect tax-gatherers and custom houses upon 
our commerce in its passage to the gulf or to the ocean.* * * 
The proposition now is to separate these United States into little 
petty confederacies: first divide them into two; and when either 
party gets beaten at the next election, subdivide again; then 
whenever one gets beaten again, another subdivision. If this new 
system of resistance by the sword and bayonet to the results 
of the ballot-box shall prevail here in this country of ours, the 
history of the United States is already written in the history of 
Mexico. 



216 THE REjS'DING OF VIRGINIA. 

THE CLARKSBURG MEETING. 

A meeting was held at Clarksburg this same dav to 
inaugurate the movement referred to in the notice in that 
morning's Intelligencer. A thousand to twelve hundred 
men assembled at the court-house there, on short notice, 
whose proceedings gave instant cohesion and direction to 
the thoughts and purposes of Union men throughout 
ISToi'th western Virginia. Thev adopted a declaration con- 
sisting of a preamble setting forth the crisis that was upon 
them, and a resolution recommending the people in all the 
counties composing I^^orthwestern Virginia that they ap- 
point delegates, not less than five in number, "of their 
wisest, best and discreetest men, to meet in convention at 
Wheeling on the 13th day of May next, to consult and 
determine upon such action as the people of ISTorthwestern 
Virginia should take in the present fearful emergency." 
The resolutions were drawn by Mr. Carlile, who had been 
in consultation with returned delegates and other leading 
men in the Panhandle. 

A reference to this meeting is made in a time-stained 
letter written to the author from a point a few miles north 
of Clarksburg April 26, 1861. The writer says: 

The meeting was addressed by Hon. John S. Carlile and 
passed some resolutions declaring their adherence to the govern- 
ment and appointing delegates to a convention to be held in 
Wheeling either on the 11th or 13th of May — I cannot tell which; 
they were all so excited when they came back that it was difficult 
to get the exact tenor of the resolutions. However, every one 
agreed that it was the intention for the Wheeling convention to 
form a provisional government. 



THE EICIIMOND CONVENTION. 217 

Express riders were immediately started to give notice of the 
movement to all the counties in this district. There was mani- 
fested the greatest enthusiasm ever seen in this county. When 
the call was made for express riders, a sufficient number volun- 
teered instantly, and old farmers, who were never known to be 
excited before, came down with their money to pay expenses 
and with offers of horses; and in a very short time the expresses 
were on their way to their different destinations. 

This reminds of Paul Revere and the crisis that sent 
him and other riders speeding out of Boston in the days 

of 1775 : 

A hurry of hoofs in a village street, 

A shape in the moonlight, a bulk in the dark, 

And beneath, from the pebbles in passing, a spark 

Struck out by a steed flying fearless and fleet. 
* * * * 

A voice in the darkness, a knock at the door, 
And a word that shall echo foi'ever more. 

THE LOCAL FERMENT. 

Going back to the conditions suddenly precipitated 
upon the people in the Northwest, it is not easy to realize 
now just what it means for intelligent and orderly com- 
munities to be all at once confronted with the appalling 
contingency of Civil War — to have all the ordinary and 
orderly course of their daily life rudely broken; to have 
the mails suspended and supplies from abroad cut off; to 
have next-door neighbors suddenly converted into deadly 
foes ; to be without means of defense ; to have rumor run 
its daily and disquieting riot ; when no one can count to- 
day what may happen tomorrow; when vague fear and 
uncertainty take the place of confidence and security, and 
each day is looked forward to with anxiety and each night 



218 THE KEXDIZ^G OF VIRGINIA, 

Avith terror. These were the conditions which suddenly 
took the place of peace and security in all the neighbor- 
hoods in most of the counties in the Northwest. Even 
those who passed through these anxieties find it difficult 
now to recall the poignancy of them, for it is one of the 
blessed offices of time to sooth the sting of painful memo- 
ries. The old-time letter from which quotation has just 
been made about the Clarksburg meeting adverted to other 
matters, interesting only as a photograph of the times 
from which it dates : 

We want to organize Union clubs in this county so we may 
know our exact strength and be prepared to defend ourselves, 
if necessary, from mobs or anything else. This is the only thing 
we have to fear here. Already this town has been threatened 
with burning; and I presume you could guess the source — the 
cut-throats across the riVer; which we think the most dangerous 
threat, as they have been accused of that sort of thing for some 
time. Similar threats have been made from the Adamsville 
region, but we all know there is not a man in all that region 
who has the courage. 

We are badly in want of arms here. None are to be had 
now for any consideration. Not one-half the Union men here 
have arms of any description. I have secured an old rifle, but iv. 

is not of much account. has just got back and says 

arms cannot possibly be had anywhere. You cannot get an old 
brass pistol as long as your little finger here for any considera- 
tion. We want a good many here and have thought of sending 
to Pittsburg for them; but we are told they are not to be had 
there; and even if they were, Virginia money would not buy 
them. I don't know what we are to do. We don't want to enlist 
because we expect to have as much fighting as we want to do 
right at home, and should we enlist we might be ordered away 
and have to leave our families unprotected. They are trying to 
raise a company for Jeff. Davis at Clarksburg, and we are in 
hopes they will, as it would remove a large amount of the off- 
scourings of humanity from our midst. 



THE EICHMOND CONVENTIOX. 219 

Judge Camden has gone to Richmond, it is thought, to con- 
sult with the Governor on the propriety of making arrests. Cam- 
den is a rank Secessionist. 

The residence of Caleb Boggess, Union delegate from Lewis 
County, was burned by Secessionists yesterday. 

I understand some river county men were at Clarksburg 
to-day in consultation with Carlile. Campbell Tarr, I think, was 
one. 

This same letter — which is long and double-lined — 
grinds a more interesting grist for Marion County : 

Marion County is as yet very doubtful. The Unionists claim 
a majority. The excitement at Fairmont is intense. Old Tom 
Raymond has been appointed General of the militia in this 
country, so I hear, and has sent Bill Thompson down to Gov- 
ernor Letcher for permission to call out a regiment for the 
"protection" of Fairmont. But the impression is that a descent 
is to be made on Wheeling and that Old Tom wants the honor 
of initiating the movement. I think Wheeling should take means 
to get information on the subject, as such a thing is not deemed 
improbable here. Virginia has a great many troops at Harper's 
Ferry now; and on the representation of Raymond that the 
thing could be done easy and that all these counties would join 
in the movement, the Governor might order on a force to take 
possession of United States property there. 

Jerry Simpson [Rev. Jeremiah Simpson of the M. P. Church] 
has just come from Fairmont this morning. He left there about 
3:00 A. M. and says the excitement is intense, and he would 
not be surprised at a riot at any moment. All the east side of 
the river are Union men. There is but one Secessionist in Pala- 
tine, George Kerr. Simpson says it is thought there that Hall 
and Haymond are confined in Richmond. Willey has come home 
but is going back. Some, however, believe that he is not as 
sound as he ought to be, and that he stayed there voluntarily and 
will go back in the same way. 

Simpson further says that Col. Dave Hewes, who is a strong 
Union man and brigade inspector for the militia in Marion, Har- 
rison and I don't know what other counties, was at Fairmont 
training the officers this week. He addressed the officers of the 



220 THE EENDING OF VIEGINIA. 

militia in Marion in a short Union speech, referring them to 
the oath they had taken to support the Constitution of the 
United States, explaining the nature of the oath; and he told 
them that oath must be maintained or they would be perjured. 
He made a similar address to the regiment at Mannington. 
While he was making his speech at Fairmont, Jim Neeson, who 
you know is a venomous Secessionist, stood near him; and when 
he had concluded, he turned to Neeson and remarked: "You, too, 
have taken that oath." 

There is a movement going on in Fairmont which I think 
means that they expect a force there. Either this or they are 
trying to intimidate the Union men. Jim Neeson is in the lead. 
He goes to every Union man, and with all the sternness he can 
command demands of each what position he intends to take or 
now occupies in the present state of affairs — whether he intends 
to stand by the Commonwealth of Virginia or not. On receiv- 
ing a negative reply, as he frequently does, he says: "Well, sir, 
you must arm yourself. You will want arms to defend yourself." 
Some think he expects a force here and is in his favorite occu- 
pation of spotting them; others that it is only an attempt to 
intimidate. Mr. Neeson frequently gets bluffed. He approached 
Colonel Moran, of the regiment on the Palatine side, with his 
usual interrogation. The Colonel told him it was none of his 
business; that the less Neeson interested himself in his affairs 
the better for him. The Colonel is the best drilled officer in 
Marion County. 

FOLLOWING THE CLAEKSBUEG LEAD. 

Other counties quickly followed the lead of the Clarks- 
burg meeting and appointed delegates to the proposed 
Wheeling Convention, declaring in most resolute terms 
their attachment to the United States, many adding that 
if driven to it the Northwest would cut loose from the 
East and set up for herself. 

At Independence, Preston County, a meeting resolved 
to raise a company of volunteers for home guards. 



THE RICHMOND CONVENTION. 221 

At Hartford City, a meeting presided over by Daniel 
Polsley declared that '4n the event Eastern Virginia per- 
sists in her secession movement, we will do all in our 
power for the separation of the Western from the Eastern 
portion of the State." 

Owen D. Downey, of Piedmont, published over his 
initials an address declaring for the Union. 

SOME VERY "independent" MILITIA. 

In Monongalia on the occasion of the May muster, two 
regiments of militia refused to drill under either Col. J. 
M. Heck or Gen. Burton Fairfax because they were Seces- 
sionists. The men offered to drill under Col. David T. 
Hewes or Coh Leroy Kramer. The Uniontown (Pa.) 
Standard received the following account of the incident 
from a gentleman who was i^resent : 

The crowd was immense and a thousand troops in line. 
Gen. Burton Fairfax and Col. J. M. Heck are both Secessionists. 
The adjutant having formed the troops in the town. Colonel 
Heck advanced in front of the staff. As he gave the - word 
"Attention" the whole regiment made a rush at him shouting 
like a thousand enraged lions. He put spurs to his horse. The 
frightened horse of General Fairfax fell with him; but springing 
up again, he rushed after the Colonel a hundred yards behind 
him. This was the end of the parade. Our informant adds that 
there were at least three hundred persons in Morgantown Satur- 
day who at a word would have hung every Secessionist in the 
county. 

Another account of the affair adds : "Home-guards 
are being formed and drilling in our neighborhood, many 
using their trusty squirrel rifles." The Morgantoivn Star 



222 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

at this juncture remarks : "Tlie people of Western Vir- 
ginia are the freest and most independent people by nature 
under the sun." And by practice also, it might have 
added, if this May muster was a sample ! 

NOT ANOTHER CENT FOR TRIBUTE. 

May 2d an enthusiastic meeting of Wheeling mer- 
chants resolved, without one dissenting voice, that they 
would pay no more revenue to ''the conspirators and trait- 
ors who now hold sway at Richmond.'" Elijah Day, the 
assessor, resigned because he was not willing to assess taxes 
which, if collectedjwould be "appropriated by the traitors." 

CHESTER HUBBARD TAKES STRONG GROUND. 

In the Wheeling meeting May 5th which was addressed 
by Mr. Porter, strong resolutions drawn by Chester D. 
Hubbard were adopted. They declared that "the action 
of the Richmond Convention purporting to have dissolved 
the connection of Virginia with the Union was, in respect 
to both the act itself and the manner of doing, an unwar- 
rantable and dangerous usurpation of power, illegal, un- 
constitutional and utterly null and void ; that Virginia is 
now, as heretofore, constitutionally and rightfully one of 
the United States of America ; that the Constitution cre- 
ates a government, not a league ; and that we will maintain 
an indefeasible allegiance to the United States." 

FRANK PEIRPOINT TO THE FRONT. 

Francis H. Peirpoint was the principal speaker at a 
mass-meeting held at Clarksburg May 3d. He spoke two 
hours and a half to an unwearied audience, so engrossing 



THE KlCIIMUXD COKVENTIOX. 



223 




Francis H. Peirpoint. 



was the interest in his theme. Kesolutions were adopted 
declaring that nothing had occurred in the operations of 
the United States government to justify the revolution 
inaugurated by the Southern States ; that the appointment 
of commissioners to represent Virginia in the Confederate 
Congress was "a. flagrant wrong upon the rights of the 
people and the fundamental principles of our govern- 
ment;" that Western Virginia had ''patiently submitted 
to and borne the heavy hand of the oppression of Eastern 
Virginia for half a century ; that now the measure of op- 
pression" was full, and "if secession is the only remedy 
offered by her for all our wrongs, the day is near when 



224 THE KENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

Western Virginia will rise in the majesty of her strength 
and patriotism and repudiate her oppressors and remain 
permanently under the stars and stripes." 

PEIEPOINT ROASTS FAIRMONT "SECESH." 

Mr. Peirpoint in a speech from the McLure House 
balcony, in Wheeling, May 11th, related some incidents 
which had come under his observation as illustrating the 
temper of Union men in his neighborhood. An officer had 
come to Grafton to make a rendezvous there for Letcher's 
troops, "if it was not offensive to the people," as he told 
the landlord of the hotel. "But," said Peirpoint, "the 
b'hoys live at Grafton — one hundred of them, as good and 
true as ever trod the soil. They went to this officer and 
said to him : 'Now, my friend, we are a hospitable people 
out here and we will be generous with you. We will give 
you until the next train starts to leave; but as sure as 
there is a God in heaven, if you come back this way, you 
will not get through.' He left by the first train." 

Mr. Peirpoint proceeded to relate how "a celebrated 
Captain from Fairmont (Cries 'What's his name?' 'His 
name is Thompson!') had gone to Grafton to establish a 
camp for the 'Marion Guards,' of which he was Captain, 
But the boys found out he was there and they went to 
him and told him if he would bring up two hundred of 
his troops they would kill them off faster than they could 
come up. He came back to Fairmont and told the Guards 
he didn't think there was any necessity for a camp at 
Grafton — no good ground there !" 



THE KICHMOND CONVENTION. 225 

On Wednesday morning the Secessionists at Fairmont were 
very brave about the encampment they were going to form, and 
they said to us Union men: "Now you fellows had better look 
out." But next day came the news of the arrival of two thousand 
rifles here in Wheeling, and their feathers fell; and now Drink- 
ard (editor of the Virginian) says there is no necessity for any 
troops in this part of the country. 

Probably no man supplied a larger proportion of the 
moral force in the resistance to secession in Northwestern 
Virginia than Francis H. Peirj^oint. In its issue of May 
6th, the Intelligencer paid him this merited tribute: 

Frank Peirpoint is one of those men well fitted for the 
stormy and revolutionary times that are upon us. He has the 
moral, physical and mental power of a leader. A truer man to 
the cause of the Union does not live; and he has the vigor of 
apprehension, that incisiveness of speech and that indomitable 
will and courage that carries the people with him. 

pokterfield's mission. 

The officer referred to by Peirpoint as having gone 
to Grafton to establish a Letcher rendezvous was Col. 
George A. Porterfield, concerning which and whom Pol- 
lard says in his Southern History of the War: 

Colonel Porterfield had been ordered to Grafton about the 
middle of May, 1861, with written instruction from General Lee 
to call for volunteers from that pai't of the State and receive 
them into the service to the number of 5,000, and to coSperate 
with the agents of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad [!], and with 
verbal orders to try to conciliate the people of that section and 
to do nothing to offend them. Finding soon after his arrival 
that the country was in a state of revolution, and that there was 
a large and increasing Federal force at Camp Denison, in Ohio, 
opposite Parkersburg, and another in the vicinity of Wheeling, 

Va.-15 



226 THE KEXDING OF VIRGIXIA. 

Colonel Porterfield wrote to the commanding general that unless 
a strong force was sent very soon. Northwestern Virginia would 
be overrun. 

Upon directing the captains of volunteer companies to pro- 
ceed with their companies to Grafton, they replied that not more 
than twenty in companies numbering sixty were willing to take 
up arms on the side of the State; that the others declared that 
if they were obliged to fight it would be in defense of the Union. 
Colonel Porterfield succeeded in a week in getting together three 
newly organized companies. This force was Increased by the 
arrival of several other companies, two of which were unarmed 
cavalry companies, amounting in all to about five hundred in- 
fantry and one hundred and fifty cavalry. These troops had been 
at Grafton but a few days when (about the 25th of May) 
Colonel Porterfield was reliably informed of the forces of the 
enemy and withdrew his command to Phillippa. Orders were 
given for the destruction of Cheat bridge, but were riot executed. 
The enemy's force at Grafton was about eight thousand men. 
On the 3rd of June, through the failure of the guard or infantry 
pickets to give the alarm, the command at Phillippa was sur- 
prised by about five thousand infantry and a battery of artillery 
and dispersed in confusion, but with inconsiderable loss of life, 
through the woods. The command had no equipments and very 
little ammunition. 

General Garnett succeeded Porterfield in the command in 
Northwestern Virginia with about six thousand men. 

LINING UP. 

In many counties people had armed themselves, either 
privately or by the organization of companies for home 
protection. In some places State volunteer companies in 
sympathy with Richmond were holding themselves in read- 
iness to receive orders from Letcher ; bnt matters soon took 
such a turn — so overpowering was the Union sentiment — 
that such organizations were put on the defensive, and 
those of them who wanted to fight for the Confederacy left 
the country, singly or in groups, and found their way into 



THE KICIIMOXD COXVENTIOX. 227 

the Confederate camps. Everywhere the lines were being 
rapidly drawn and men compelled to take their stand on 
one side or the other. 

THE CITY OF REFUGE. 

Wheeling', by reason of its geographic location and 
equally because of its resolute Unionism, was the city of 
refuge towards which the loyalists throughout Northwestern 
Virginia turned their eyes in this emergency. Carlile went 
to Wheeling early, to be in consultation with the Pan- 
handle members of the Convention and other leaders of 
public opinion to be met at that point. Willey held aloof 
and reports were rife that he was disaifected, and that on 
his way home through Virginia he had made a speech 
in v.'hich he had violently denounced President Lincoln 
for issuing his call for troops. Granville Parker, in his 
''Formation of West Virginia," notices these reports in 
connection with his comment on the election of Mr. Willey 
as senator over Lamb and Van Winkle. But generally 
from every quarter the note that came up from the Union 
element was one of attachment to and confidence in the 
government as the only possible breakwater against the 
rising tide of the Confederacy in Virginia. 

THE PANHANDLE GETS GUNS. 

There was abundance of courage but lack of weapons 
to make it effective, if the actual emergency of an attempt 
by Letcher or Lee to mobilize or quarter troops in the 
N'orthwest should have to be suddenly met. In the Pan- 
handle the consciousness of this need took shape, A com- 
mittee of Brooke County men — Campbell Tarr, Adam 



228 THE RENDING OF VIEGINIA. 

Kiihn, Joseph Applegate and David Fleming — went to 
Washington to procure arms. They called on Edwin M. 
Stanton, with whom as a lawyer at Steubenville some of 
them had a personal acquaintance, and who was then prac- 
ticing his profession at Washington, and he introduced 
them to Simon Cameron, Secretary of War. Upon Mr. 
Cameron hesitating as to his legal right to supply govern- 
ment arms to private citizens, Stanton told him "The law 
of necessity gives the right. Let them have the arms, and 
look for the book law afterwards." Mr. Cameron was 
convinced ; and on the 8th of May 2000 of Maynard's self- 
priming rifles, with munitions and accoutrements com- 
plete, were unloaded from a Pittsburg steamer at Wells- 
burg. Announcement of their arrival was made in the 
Wheeling Intelligencer in these words: 

We have the unspeakable satisfaction of announcing that 
two thousand United States Minie rifles, with munitions and 
equipments, have arrived for the Union men of the Panhandle. 

In the same issue appeared a letter from the Secretary 
of War to John H. Atkinson, of New Cumberland, under 
date of April 16th, as follows: 

In those States in which the executives have refused to 
obey the call of the President for troops, volunteers enrolled 
and organized into companies, batallions or regiments and 
inspected, if mustered into the service of the United States, will 
be armed and equipped by the Government. 

These announcements had an inspiring effect on the 
Union people throughout the I^orthwest and correspond- 
ingly discouraged the other side, as illustrated in the story 
Peirpoint told about the change of views wrought in the 
mind of Editor Drinkard at Fairmont. 



THE RierOIOXD COXVENTIOX. 229 

THE riKE RISES. 

May lOth, the Wheeling Intelligencer said editorially: 

The Union men are rising in their strength. Letters are 
exhibited to us by friends here in the city from their friends, 
acquaintances and relatives in all the various counties of West- 
ern Virginia, and so far as we have read them they bring good 
news. There is a most unprecedented awaltening on the subject 
of secession. The fact that we have been foully, treacherously 
and despotically dealt with has come upon the convictions of the 
people like a horrid fright. That fright has been succeeded 
by a most intense indignation, which is rapidly kindling into a 
towering and devouring flame of resentment and repudiation. 

The New York Times about this period made this con^ 
ment : 

Virginia in rebellion, one-half her territory gravitates by 
kindred attraction to the North. Already is a victory gained 
which is conclusive of the whole contest. A territory equal to 
a first-class State is thrown off from the South by mere force 
of repulsion. It can never be reclaimed. Its people have no 
sympathy with slave propagandism and earnestly cling to a 
government which maintains law and order. 

A JUDICIAL CRANK. 

Judge George ^Y. Thompson, of Wheeling, Avhose son 
William P. was the Captain of the "Marion Guards" re- 
ferred to by Peirpoint in his McLurc House speech, wait- 
ing Letcher's call to enter the Confederate service, under- 
took at this time to employ his judicial functions to 
intimidate the Unionists. Friday morning. May 10th, he 
charged the grand jury at Wheeling that : 

If any person should attempt, by force or in any other 
manner than is constitutionally and lawfully provided for, to 
separate the State and establish a different government from the 



230 THE KEXDING OF VIEGINIA. 

existent one, it would not only be treason against the State, 
but it would be contrary to the Constitution of the United States; 
and if he should hear of any such design or attempt to subvert 
the State government in his judicial district, he would convene 
court in every county and bring such offenders to the bar of 
justice for their crime. 

It must not be supposed this fulmination was aimed, 
as it might justly have been, at Jefferson Davis and the 
Convention commissioners who had just set up the gov- 
ernment of the Confederate States in Virginia. It was 
directed at the much smaller game, the persons who were 
talking about a division of the State. But the threat fell 
flat. jSTobody paid any attention to it. All realized that 
however else the fundamental questions at issue might be 
solved, they were not to be solved by the interpretation of 
small-bore courts. 




Wheeling in 1900. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

THE MAY CONVBTTTION'— 0]aGAiTIZI]Sra EESISTANCE. 

THE DAY THE CITY THE PEOPLE. 

Monday, the 13tli day of May, 1861, opened clear and 
auspicious for the gathering set for that day in the smoky, 
busy little city beside the Ohio, at the foot of the great 
rugged hills still part of the sacred possessions of the Old 
Dominion, projected aggressively far north between the 
alien territory of two free States. A fresh breeze coming 
across the river from the boundless West lifted the usual 
canopy of smoke and showed the old Virginia town in 
gala-day attire. Early in the morning people began to 
circulate in unusual numbers in the streets, and incoming- 
steamboats and trains to swell the crowds. The city had 
adorned itself with the ISTational colors, as a bride decks 
herself for the wedding-day. Great flags streamed from 
house roofs and from cables stretched across the streets. 
Smaller banners fluttered from windows and doorways. 
Teams were decked with little flags, while Union badges 
and red-white-and-blue rosettes were profusely displayed 
upon the persons of men, women and children. 

As the arriving delegations marched froiu steamer or 
train, to the strains of numerous bands, flags flying, crowds 
cheering, it was a spectacle to stir the blood. It was esti- 
mated that so many Virginians had never been in Wheel- 
ing at one time before. On most gala occasions in the Nail 

231 



232 TKE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

City, the crowds had been largely made up from neigh- 
boring Ohio and Pennsylvania; but this was a day that 
appealed chiefly to Western Virginians, and they were 
alivg and enthusiastic in their response. *'The people from 
the mountain and river counties in attendance on the Con- 
vention," said the Intelligencer, "are far ahead of us in 
enthusiasm and devotion to the Union, and have forced 
the Panhandle to yield its claim to being the especially 
loyal." 

An incident of the day was that Thomas Hornbrook, 
who had just been appointed U. S. Collector of Customs at 
the port of Wheeling, superseding Andrew J. Pannell, 
raised a new United States flag over the Federal Building 
at the corner of Market and John Streets. A stand had 
been erected on the opposite side of Market ; and after an 
opening prayer by Kev. Wesley Smith, the flag was run 
up and greeted with cheers from the multitude in the 
streets. The Star Spangled Banner was sung by a choir, 
the people joining in the chorus. An address by Hon. 
John S. Carlile followed and was rapturously applauded. 

THE FEELING AND THE PROBLEM. 

Resistance to secession — resistance to the death — was 
the universally expressed determination. That was past 
all discussion. The problem was how most effectively to 
organize it and save Western Virginia to the Union. 

On the eve of this historic Convention, the Wheeling 
Intelligencer had asked if there was "a. man from all the 
Northwest who has the nerve and genius to lead this great 



THE MAY CONVENTIOA". 233 

movement ? Who can concentrate the scattered elements 
and bring" their chaotic fragments into form ?" The ques- 
tion found its answer in the event, not in quite the 
shape in which it had been put. The movement found not 
one leader on whom its success supremely depended ; but. 
^\hat was better, a number who with united patriotic pur- 
pose solved its problems and gave it direction. We shall 
see as the story progresses that this movement was greater 
than its leaders ; that there was a moral power in it which 
drove it on to success regardless of leadership or the ab- 
sence of it ; in spite of half-heartedness and actual hos- 
tility, on the one hand, and of treacherous leadership on 
the other. The result, we must recognize, was a part of 
the great Xational triumph which alone made it possible. 
The leaders worked wisely in harmony with the struggle 
to preserve nationality and therein found the road to their 
own success. Many years later, I casually met Daniel 
Lamb in the lobby of the Wheeling postofhce, and the con- 
versation wTut back to the stirring times of 1861-2-3. "If 
it were all to do over again," was Mr. Lamb's concluding 
remark, "looking back to it now after all these years, I 
cannot see where a single one of our steps could have been 
more wisely taken." 

THE NEWSPAPEK CORPS. 

The delegates assembled in Washington Hall at eleven 
A. M. The great audience room was filled with an eager, 
expectant, fluttering mass. The wide stage, on which sat 
manv of the most eminent citizens of the Northwest, was 



234 THE EENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

decorated with the national colors. In front of the stage 
on the main floor were tables for the press; at which, 
during the sessions, besides reporters of the city papers, 
sat the following from other cities : 

Mr. Glenn, of the New York Herald; 

Edward F. Underbill, New York Times; 

Ainsworth R. Spofford, Cincinnati Commercial; 

J. J. Henderson, Cincinnati Gazette; 

Daniel O'Neill, Pittsburg Chronicle; 

Fred Foster, Pittshurg Dispatch; 

S. D. Page, Cleveland Leader; 

John D. M. Carr, Chicago Press and Tribune, 

Of these, Mr. Glenn had just come from Pensacola, 
where he had seen the rebels take possession of Fort Pick- 
ens. Underhill, after the Convention, went East via the 
Baltimore & Ohio Railroad and was taken from the car 
by the rebels at Harper's Ferry, and there held some time 
as a prisoner under pretense of a belief that ho was a spy. 
He was confined in a part of the armory that had been 
held by John Brown and exposed to insult from the rabble. 
A rope was thrown over a limb of a tree so that a loop at 
the end of it dangled ■before a window of the crib in which 
he was confined. He was later removed to the jail at 
Charlestown whence Brown had marched to the gallows. 
Spoiford became Librarian of Congress, and is still in the 
ISTational Library in an auxiliary position. Fred Foster 
afterwards became editor on the Wheeling Press, and ac- 
companied Governor Peirpoint as his secretary when the 
capital of the Restored Government of Virginia was re- 
moved to Alexandria, upon the advent of West Virginia. 



THE MAY CONVENTION. 235 

THE OPENING. 

^ 

There was manifest throughout the audience the tense, 
electric feeling which pervades great assemblies in times 
of excitement ; and it was a relief when Chester D. Hub- 
bard, of Wheeling, came forward on the stage and nomi- 
nated for temporary chairman William B. Zinn, of Pres- 
ton County — a rugged old mountaineer, who afterwards 
rej^resented his county in the June Convention and House 
of Delegates. Mr. Zinn was escorted to the chair by Hon. 
John S. Carlile, of Harrison. 

George R. Latham, at that time editor of the Grafton 
West Virginian J commissioned in May, 1862, Colonel of 
the Fifth Cavalry, afterwards member of the United 
States House of ^Representatives and later Minister to 
Melbourne, was made temporary secretary. 

At the suggestion of Gen. John J. Jackson, of Wood, 
Rev. Peter T. Laishley, a delegate from Monongalia, of- 
fered 23rayer. In the course of his petition Mr. Laishley 
prayed that the stars and stripes might ever wave over 
this land "from the Atlantic to the Pacific — from Maine 
to California" (nothing about the Gulf) and that those 
who would plunge the country into discord might be over- 
reached by the omnipotent arm ; that this Convention 
might "act promptly, decisively and harmoniously." 

A NOTE OF DISCORD. 

General Jackson moved that any gentleman present 
from any county in ^orthw^estern Virginia be received 
as a delegate. 



236 THE REXDIXG OF VIRGIXIA. 

John S. Burdett, of Taylor, suggested to include the 
Valley. 

Mr. Carlile asked General Jackson to withdraw his 
proposition. He trusted this was to be a deliberative 
body, composed only of those who came with the authority 
conferred upon them by the people of their counties who 
appointed them. He would not wish to prevent any gentle- 
man from Northwestern Virginia, or anywhere else, from 
taking a seat on this floor and listening to the delibera- 
tions of this body; but he desired whatever action might 
be taken should be sanctioned by the authority of the peo- 
ple. In his county, at least, men had been selected with 
reference to the interests involved in the action of this 
Convention. The first thing was to provide for a perma- 
nent organization by the appointment of a committee on 
credentials, who would ascertain and report the names of 
those who were really the representatives of the people. 

General Jackson thought it would be difficult to dis- 
cover who were the real representatives of the people. The 
delegation from Wood County were prepared to take the 
responsibility of acting as delegates although not appointed 
as such. He had no doubt gentlemen had been sent here 
by proper and responsible bodies ; but if they were to take 
great and momentous action, "let us have our whole peo- 
ple with us." He declined to withdraw his proposition. 

Mr. Carlile said it was unfortunate that at the very 
threshold of their proceedings there should be this exhibi- 
tion of a division of sentiment. If he had not conceived 
that the adoption of the proposition of the gentleman from 
Wood would prove fatal to every step hereafter to be taken, 
he would have remained silent in his seat. He himself was 



THE MAY CONVENTION. 



237 




John S. Cablile. 



here by the voice of the qualified voters of his county 
•greater than was given him at the polls on the 4th of Feb- 
ruary as delegate to the Richmond Convention. 'No court- 
house clique in his county had sent delegates here. All 
his colleagues were here by the same voice and power. It 
was the court-house cliques that had brought the good oM 
State to the brink of ruin. He looked upon this body as 
possessing all the power it could possess if it were a legis- 
lative body elected under the forms of law ; and who ever 
heard of a legal deliberative body being composed of gen- 
tlemen who might happen to be present from the various 
counties of the State in which thev reside ? He trusted it 



238 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

would be the pleasure of the Convention to proceed as a 
deliberative body, and that none would act except those 
sent here bv their people. Other' fellow-citizens present 
could occupy the rear of the hall, see what is going on and 
give us the benefit of an outside pressure, as had been done 
elsewhere for their enslavement. 

General Jackson contended there could be no legal 
means to determine by what authority a gentleman was 
here. He wanted to include all the gentlemen present 
from any counties in this part of the State and also from 
Frederick and Berkeley. 

Mr. Carlile trusted the legal and parliamentary prece- 
dents in England and in this country, and in all countries 
where deliberative bodies have assembled, would be fol- 
lowed by this Convention. "You meet and for the mere 
purpose of calling the body to order put some one in the 
chair and provide a temporary secretary. The next step 
is to elect a permanent presiding officer and secretary 
whose business it is to record your proceedings and who is 
responsible for them. The next to appoint a committee 
on credentials; and that committee reports to the body 
who are entitled to seats in it. I trust that we will follow 
precedent here and that the grave authority that clothes 
every deliberative body will clothe this one. I may be 
enthusiastic — I may be ahead of the times — but I believe, 
as much as I believe in the existence of a God, that our 
salvation, and it may be the salvation of our whole coun- 
try, depends on the deliberations of this body and its ac- 
tion ; and I want it to go abroad all over the land with 
all the prestige that parliamentary usage can give it." 



THE MAY CONVEI^TIO::^. 2%^ 

General Jacksou said he did not understand that the 
Convention was here for the purpose of forming a pro- 
visional government, but for deliberation and conference. 

Mr. Carlile replied that if thev had come here only to 
consult and then adjourn and go home, he had no further 
interest here. The people he represented, he said, "expect 
that we will never adjourn until their safety is secured 
beyond a doubt in the Union and under the flag. If we 
temporize now, and consult and adjourn to coipe back here 
again, before that day arrives you will have sworn al- 
legiance to the rattlesnake flag." 

Francis H. Peirpoint, of Marion, suggested to General 
Jackson that he withdraw his motion and allow a commit- 
tee on credentials to be appointed. Let the delegations re- 
port to the committee, "and when we vote on resolutions it 
will be on the basis of the population of the counties." 

General Jackson said he had no sort of objection to 
this; but he said according to Mr, Carlile's position, all 
those delegates not formally appointed would be excluded. 
A Convention such as that gentleman wanted would not 
be so effective as it would be while admitting the mass of 
those who had come here as citizens rather than as dele- 
gates. It would not look so much like an upheaval of the 
people. 

Mr. Burdett said- that for his part he had not come 
here to talk. He came here for action. "While we are 
talking," he said, "the chains have already been forged for 
us and the bayonets are threatening invasion. In my 
town of Grafton, Letcher has ordered his troops to rendez- 
vous." It was no time to debate or evince feeling. 



240 THE EENDIXG OF VIKGI^NriA. 

Mr. Hubbard moved that a committee, comiDosed of one 
from each county represented, be appointed; to whom 
should be referred the subject of representation, and also 
the nomination of permanent officers of the Convention. 
This motion prevailed ; and then it was agreed, on motion 
of George H. Kidd, of Preston, that an adjournment be 
taken to 3 p. m. ; and that in the meantime the delegations 
from the several counties report to the president of the 
Convention the name of one of their number to be their 
representative on the committee on representation and per- 
manent organization, and that the delegations meet as soon 
as possible for this purpose. 

CONVENTION ORGANIZED. 

At the opening of the afternoon session, Andrew 
riesher, of Jackson, chairman of the committee, reported 
the following nominations: 

For permanent president. Dr. John W. Moss, of Wood. 

For permanent secretaries. Col. C. B. Waggener, of 
Mason ; Marshall M. Dent, of Monongalia, and Gibson L. 
Cranmer, of Ohio. 

The committee asked further time to consider the cre- 
dentials of delegates. The report as to permanent officers 
was adopted, and Dr. Moss was conducted to the chair 
by Messrs. Carlile, Peirpoint, and MclSTeill, of Monon- 
galia. The organization w^as completed, on motion of Mr. 
Burdett, by the appointment of James M. Ewing as ser- 
geant-at-arms and A. Clemens and R. Higgins as doorkeep- 
ers. 



THE MAY CONVENTION. 241 

It was agreed that the Convention should meet at 10 
A. M., adjourn at noon, and reassemble at 2 p. m.^ each 
succeeding day while the session lasted. 

General Jackson, obtaining the floor, made a lengthy 
speech defining his position. He was opposed to the Con- 
vention taking any decisive action ; thought it would be 
premature, revolutionary and altogether unwise. He was 
in favor of the Convention passing a series of resolutions 
expressive of the wrongs of the Northwest, and then ad- 
journing at least until after the election ; and urged tliat 
meanwhile the counties should be canvassed to defeat the 
ratification of the ordinance of secession. When this had 
been done, and every peaceable method of defense ex- 
hausted, he would then go in for a division of the State. 
He characterized the policy foreshadowed by Mr. Carlile 
as calculated to place the Northwest at once in the midst 
of Civil War. He believed we might, after a while, and 
by going about it in the right way, effect a peaceable di- 
vision of the State ; but he urged that the people of the 
interior counties were not ripe for it yet. 

Mr. Burdett interrupted at one point and asked: Sup- 
posing, in the meantime, while thus waiting, Letcher should 
throw his troops into this part of the State to intimidate 
Union men and carry the election by violence and force, 
as they will do in the East, what did General Jackson 
propose to do in such a case ? ''We must meet the emer- 
gency now," said Mr. Burdett, and the Convention re- 
sponded to the declaration with applause. 

Mr. Carlile replied to General Jackson. If he had 
supposed the deliberations of this body were to be limited to 
the adoption of a few paper resolutions, he would not have 

Va.-16 



242 IHE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

gone through what he had in furtherance of what he had 
supposed woukl be the action of this Convention — in fur- 
therance of the efforts that were necessary to maintain the 
liberties of a patriotic people. "N^eed mj friend from 
Wood," he said, ''be informed that the day has gone by 
for plunging the ijeople of the Northwestern part of the 
State into revolution, as he terms it ? We are already in 
revolution, not by our act but by that of the usurpers sit- 
ting in dark conclave at Richmond. I presumed it was 
the mission of this body to devise such measures as would 
protect us from the consequences which must inevitably 
flow from that usurpation. We are the only portion of the 
State that is not now under military despotism. The order 
has gone forth, and it is even at this hour being executed, 
by which we are to share the fate that has been imposed 
on other portions of the State. The soldiers have been 
ordered to rendezvous at various points in this part of the 
C^ommonwealth. 'No people who contented themselves with 
paper resolves, while bayonets were bristling all around 
them and war was being brought to their very doors as 
rapidly as it could be, ever maintained their freedom in 
this way. * * * When has there ever been in the rec- 
ords of the past such an utter contempt on the part of any 
despot for the people as exhibited here, in what was once 
free Virginia, by the Richmond Convention ? You deter- 
mine at the polls by more than fifty thousand majority 
that no act of that Convention should change your relations 
to the Federal government without being first ratified by 
you; and even before the ordinance is passed they place 
you in hostility to the government !" 



THE MAY CONVENTION. 243 

General Jackson wished to know how prompt action by 
this Convention would overcome the difficulty ? 

CAELILE SWAYS THE CKOWD. 

Mr. Carlile: Let this Convention show its loyalty to 
the Union and call upoji the government to furnish them 
with means of defense, and they will be furnished. "There 
are two thousand minie muskets here now, and more are 
on the way, thank God." (The announcement was greeted 
with cheers.) "Let us," continued Carlile, "repudiate 
these monstrous usurpations ; let us show our loyalty to 
Virginia and the Union ; and let us maintain ourselves in 
the Union at every hazard. It is useless to 'cry peace 
when there is no peace' ; and 1, for one, will repeat what 
was said by one of Virginia's noblest sons and greatest 
statesmen : 'Give me liberty or give me death.' " 

This declaration was received with loud and continued 
applause, indicating that the great body of those present 
sympathized with a vigorous policy as against any tem- 
porizing. 

THE DELEGATES. 

The Committee on Credentials then submitted their 
supplemental report, showing duly accredited delegates 
from the counties of Hancock, Brooke, Ohio, Marshall, 
Marion, Monongalia, Preston, Harrison, Wood, Ritchie, 
Lewis, Upshur, Gilmer, Wirt, Jackson, Mason, Wetzel, 
Pleasants, Barbour, Hampshire, Berkeley, Taylor, Tyler, 
Doddridge and Roane, as follows: 



244 



THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 



HANCOCK. 



George McC. Porte'', 
William L. Crawford, 
Louis R. Smith, 
B. J. Smith, 
J. C. Crawford, 
Thomas Anderson, 
W. B. Freeman, 
W. C. Murray, 
J. L. Freeman, 
John Gardner, 
George Johnson, 
J. S. Porter, 
James Stevenson, 
J. S. Pomeroy, 
R. Brenamen, 
Daniel Donehoo, 



D. S. Nicholson, 
Thayer Melvin, 
Ewing Turner, 
James H. Pugh, 
H. Farnsworth, 
James G. Marshall, 
Samuel Freeman, 
John Mahan, 
David Jenkins, 
William Hewitt, 
William Brown, 
A. Moore, 
D. C. Pugh, 
Jonathan Allison. 
John H. Atkinson, 
Joseph W. Allison. 



BROOKE. 



Adam Kuhn, 
David Hervey, 
Campbell Tarr, 
Nathaniel Wells, 
J. R. Burgoyne, 
James Archer, 
Jesse Edgington, 
R. L. Jones, 



James A. Campbell, 
Robert Nicholls, 
Joseph Gist, 
John G. Jacob, 
Eli Green, 
J. D. Nichols, 
Bazabel Wells, 
M. Walker. 



OHIO. 



Lewis S. Delaplain, 
J. R. Stifel, 
Alfred Caldwell, 
John McLure, jr., 
Andrew Wilson, 
George Forbes, 
A. J. Woods, 
Thomas H. Logan, 



John Stiner, 
Daniel Lamb, 
Chester D. Hubbard, 
S. H. Woodward, 
James W. Paxton, 
A. Hanlan, 
S. Waterhouse, 
Gibson L. Cranmer, 



THE MAY CONVENTION. 



245 



James S. Wheat, 
George W. Norton, 
N. H. Garrison, 
E. Buchanan, 
John Pierson, 
Perry Wbitham, 
E. McCaslin, 
A. Bolton Caldwell, 
John R. Hubbard, 
Andrew F. Ross, 
William B. Curtis, 



Jacob Hornbrook, 
L. D. Wait, 
John K. Botsford, 
George Bowers, 
Robert Crangle, 
Jacob M. Bickel, 
James Paull, 
John G. Hoffman, 
Jacob Berger, 
A. Bedilion, Sr., 
James C. Orr. 



MARSHALL. 



John H. Dickey, 
John Parkinson, 
Thomas Morris, 
William Alexander, 
/John Laughlin, 
William T. Head, 
J. S. Parriott, 
William I. Purdy, 
H. C. Kemple, 
Joseph Turner, 
Hiram McMechen, 
Elbert H. Caldwell, 
James Garvin, 
L. Gardner, 
H. A. Francis, 
Thomas Dowler, 
John R. Morrow, 
William Wasson, 
Nat Wilson, 
Thomas Morgan, 
S. Dorsey, Jr., 
R. B. Hunter, 
J. W. McCarrigan, 
J. B. Morris, 
R. C. Holliday, 
William Collins, 



J. Winders, 

William Baird, 

Dr. Marshman, 

William Luke, 

J. Garvin, 

S. Ingram, 

William Phillips, Jr., 

A. Francis, 

Thomas Wilson, 

Lot Enochs, 

G. Hubbs, 

John Wilson, 

John Ritchie, 

J. W. Bonar, 

J. Alley, 

S. B. Stidger, 

Asa Browning, 

Samuel Wilson, 

J. McConnell, 

A. Bonar, 

D. Price, 

G. W. Evans, 

D. Roberts, 

George Hubbs, 

Thomas Dowler, 

R. Alexander, 



246 



THE RENDING OF VIEGINIA, 



W. R. Kimmons, 
G. W. Evans, 
William McFarland, 
J. Hornbrookj 
John Reynolds, 
R. Swan, 
J. B. Hornbrook, 
James Campbell, 
F. Clement, 



E. Conner, 
Charles Snediker, 
John Winters, 
Nathan Fish, 
V. P. Gorby, 
Alf Gaines, 
J. S. Riggs, 
Alexander Kemple, 
Joseph McCombs. 



WETZEL. 



F. E. Williams, 
John Murphy, 
Elijah Morgan, 
William Barrows, 
B. T. Bowers, 
J. R. Brown, 
J. M. Bell, 
Jacob Young, 
Reuben Martin, 
R. Reed, Sr., 
Richard Cook, 



D. D. Johnson, 
Daniel Sweeney, 
V. Smith, 
W. B. Kerr, 
J. C. Parker, 
James M. Smith, 



A. McEldowney, 

B. Van Camp, 
John McClaskey, 
S. Stephens, 

R. W. Lauck, 
John Alley, 
Thomas McQuown, 
George W. Bier, 
William D. Welker, 
R. S. Sayers. 



TYLER. 



J. H. Johnson, 
Isaac Davis, 
S. H. Hawkins, 
D. King, 
William Pritchard. 



HARRISON. 



John S. Carlile, 
Thomas L. Moore, 
John J. Davis, 
Solomon S. Fleming, 
Felix S. Sturm, 
James Lynch, 



William E. Lyon, 
Lot Bowen, 
Dr. Duncan, 
Waldo P. Goff, 
B. P. Shuttleswortb. 



THE IVIAY CONVENTION. 
PLEASANTS. 



24^ 



Friend Cocliran, 
Robert Parker, 



R. A. Cramer, 

James W. Williamson. 



WOOD. 



S. L. A. Burche, 
John J. Jackson, 
J. D. Ingram, 
A. Laughling, 
W. Vroman, 
J. C. Rathbone, 
G. E. Smith, 

D. K. Baylor, 
M. Woods, 
Andrew Als, 
Joseph Dagg, Jr., 
N. W. Warlow, 
Peter Riddle, t 
John Paugh, 

T. E. McPherson, 
Thompson Leach, 
S. S. Spencer, 

E. Deem, 

N. H. Colston, 

A. Hinkley, 

Bennett Cook, 

George W. Henderson, 

George Loomis, 

J. L. Padgitt, 

S. D. Compton, 

S. M. Peterson, 

G. H. Ralston, 

V. A. Dunbar, 

A. R Dye, 

W. H. Baker, 

William Johnson, Jr., 

Jesse Burche, 



John McKibbin, 

W. Athey, 

C. Hunter, 

R. H. Burke, 

W. P. Davis, 

George Compton, 

C. M. Cole, 

Roger Tiffins, 

Edward Hoyt, 

W. B. Casewell, 

Peter Dils, 

W. F. Henry, 

A. C. McKinzey, 

Rufus Kinward, 

John J. Jackson, Jr., 

J. J. Neall, 

T. Hunter, 

M. P. Amiss, 

J. Barnett, 

T. S. Conley, 

C. J. Neall, 

J. G. Blackford, 

Henry Cole, 

William E. Stevenson, 

Jesse Murdock, 

J. Burche, 

J. Morrison, 

A. H. Hatcher, 

A. Mather, 

G.fB. Smith, 

AUhur Drake, 

H. Rider, 



248 



THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 



S. Ogden, 
Sardis Cole, 
P. Reed, 



B. H. Kukey, 

Dr. John Wo Moss, 

R. S. Smith. 



MONONGALIA. 



Waitman T. Willey, 

Col. James Evans, 

Col. Leroy Kramer, 

Col. William A. Hanaway, 

Capt. William Lazear, 

Elisha Coombs, 

George McNeeley, 

Col. Henry Bering, 

Dr. H. N. Mackey, 

Evans D. Fogle, 

James T. McClaskey, 

James T. Hess, 

Charles H. Burgess, 

John Bly, 

William Price, 

Dr. A. Brown, 

Dr. J. V. Boughner, 

E. P. Fitch, 

E. B. Tygard, 



H. C. Hagans, 
R. C. Crooks, 
William H. King, 
James W. Brown, 
Charles Hooton, 
Summers McCrum, 
William B. Zinn, 



Andrew Flesher, 
D. Woodruff, 
C. M. Rice, 
J. F. Scott, 



Alpheus Garrison, 
Dr. John McCarl, 
J. A. Wiley, 
Joseph Snyder, 
Joel Bowlsby, 
A. Derrault, 
Amos S. Bowlsby, 
N. C. Vandervorti 
Daniel White, 
Dr. Dennis B. Dorsey, 
Jacob Miller, 
Dr. Isaac Scott, 
Marshall M. Dent, 
Dr. P. T. Laishley, 
Ed. P. St. Clair, 
William B. Shaw, 
P. L. Rice, 
Joseph Jolliffe, 
William Anderson. 



PRESTON. 



W. T. Brown, 
Reuben Morris, 
D. A. Letzinger, 
John Howard, 
George H. Kidd, 
James Alex Brov/n, 
William P. Fortney. 



JACKSON. 



George Leonard, 
G. L. Kennedy, 
J. V, Rowley. 



THE MAY CONVENTION. 



249 



MARION. 



R. R. Brown, 
J. C. Beeson, 
Isaac Holman, 
Thomas H. Bains, 
Hiram Haymond, 
N. Merrifield, 
Joshua Carter, 
G. W. Jolliff, 



John Chisler, 
Thomas Hough, 
William Beatty, 
James C. Beatty, 
Aaron Hawkins, 
Jacob Streams, 
Francis H. Peirpoint, 
Jesse Shaw. 



Joseph H. Macher, 
Samuel Harpold, 
W. E. Wetzel, 
John Godlez, 
Wrat Wellis, 
W. W. Harper. 
William Harpold, 
Daniel Polsley, 
Samuel Davis, 
J. N. Jones, 
S. Yeager, 
R. C. M. Lovell, 

B. J. Rollins, 
D. C. Sage, 

C. H. Bumgardner, 



W. H. Williams, 



Henry Newman, 
E. T. Graham, 



Noah Rexroad, 
D. Rexroad. 



MASON. 

John O. Butler^ 
Timothy Russell, 
John Hall, 

A. A. Reager, 
W. Hopkins, 
E. B. Davis, 
David Rossin, 
John J. Weir, 
Asa Brigham, 
Charles B. Waggener, 
John M. Phelps, 
Stephen Comstock, 

W. C. Sharr, 
Apollo Stevens, 
Major Brown. 

UPSHUR. 

C. P. Rohrbaugh. 

WIRT. 

B. Ball. 

RITCHIE. 

J. P. Harris, 
A. S. Cole. 



250 



THE RE:SfDINCT OF VIRGINIA. 



O. D. Downey, 
George W. Broski, 
Dr. B. B. Shaw, 



A. R, McQuilken, 
John W. Daily, 

E. H. Menefee, 
Spencer Dayton, 

J. Cheuvront, 
S. S. Kinney, 
J. Smith, 

F. M. Chalfant, 
A. S. Withers, 
J. W. Hudson, 
P. M. Hale, 



J. Means, 
J. M. Wilson, 
T. Kennedy, 
T. Gather, 
John S. Burdett, 



HAMPSHIRE. 

George W. Sheets, 
George W. Rizen 

BERKELEY. 

J. S. Bowers. 

BARBOUR. 

J. H. Shuttlesworth. 

DODDRIDGE. 

J. A. Foley, 

J. P. F. Randolph. 

LEWIS. . 

J. Woofter, 

W. L. Grant, 

J. A. J. Lightburn. 

ROANE. 

Irwin C. Stump. 

TAYLOR. 

J. J. Allen, 
B. Bailey, 
J. J. Warren, 
George R. Latham, 
T. T. Monroe. 



The following resolutions recommended by the com- 
mittee were agreed to : 

That the President be authorized to present cards of admis- 
sion to the floor of the Convention to such citizens in attendance 
from different parts of the State as sympathize with the objects 
of the Convention and are good and true friends of the Union. 



THE MAY CONVENTION. 



251 




Campbell Tare. 

That each member of the committee furnish the secretaries 
a list of delegates now in attendance from the county repre- 
sented by such member. 

That the vote to be taken on any question when demanded 
by twenty-five members shall be taken on the basis of the vote 
cast by each county in the last presidential election, the vote 
to be cast by the chairman of the delegation; on all other ques- 
tions the vote to be taken per capita. 

BUSINESS COMMITTEE. 



Campbell Tarr, of Brooke, moved, and it was agreed, 
that one member from each county represented be ap- 
pointed by the president as a Committee on State and Fed- 



252 THE BENDING OF VIKGINIA. 

era! Relations, to whom should be referred all resolutions 
looking to action by the Convention. The committee ap- 
pointed under this resolution was the following: 

Brooke, Campbell Tarr. Wirt, E. T. Fraham. 
Monongalia, Waitman T. Willey. Marion, Francis H. Peirpoint. 

Harrison, John S. Carlile. Barbour, Spencer Dayton. 

Wood, John J. Jackson. Frederick, George S. Senseney. 

Preston, Charles Hooton. Taylor, John S. Burdett. 

Ohio, Daniel Lamb. Berkeley, A. R. McQuilken. 
Hancock, George McC. Porter. Pleasants, S. Cochran. 

Mason, Joseph Macker. Roane, I. C. Stump. 

Tyler, Daniel D. Johnson. Gilmer, S. Martin. 

Jackson, James Scott. Upshur, A. B. Rohrbaugh. 

Wetzel, George W. Bier. Hampshire, O. D. Downey. 

Marshall, R. C. Holliday. Doddridge, James A. Foley. 
Lewis, A. S. Withers. 

Waitman T. Willey obtained the floor and proceeded to 
address the Convention, taking substantially the position 
taken by General Jackson against any immediate meas- 
ures looking to an independent State organization. He 
was followed by Campbell Tarr, wdio reviewed the posi- 
tions of Willey and Jackson with a good deal of severity. 
He declared the time for compromises, talk and temporiz- 
ing was past; that now nothing but prompt and decisive 
action could avert the impending dangers. This was the 
time to strike, and he knew a response to that declaration 
would come up from the entire valley from the Ohio to the 
Alleghenies. 

MB. WILLEY EXPLAINS. 

The second day of the Convention was opened with 
prayer by Rev. Wesley Smith, of the Methodist Church. 

Mr. Willey, rising to a privileged question and refer- 
ring to his remarks the previous evening, said he had been 



THE MAY CONVENTION. 



253 



misimderstood to say that his view of the proper eourso 
for the Convention to pursue was that it should adjourn 
until after the ensuing election without taking any action 
whatever. He had intended to say that he differed from 
Mr. Carlile in the views that gentleman entertained re- 
garding the proper course to be pursued here. But he 
wished to declare a distinct and unequivocal position in 
condemnation of the usurpation at Eichmond and lay 
down a platform upon which to organize the public senti- 
ment for a separation from the rest of the State. Previous 
engagements would necessarily call him away from the 
Convention to-morrow, and he would ask to be released 
from the position assigned him upon the Committee on 
State and Federal Relations. 

COLONEL WHEAT BOILS IT DOWN. 

James S. Wheat, of Ohio, offered the following, which 
went to the committee : 

1. Resolved. That in our deliberate judgment, the ordinance 
passed by the Convention of Virginia on the 17th day of April, 
1861, commonly known as the ordinance of secession, by which 
said Convention undertook in the name of the State of Virginia 
to repeal the ratification of the Constitution of the United States 
of America by this State, and to resume all the rights and 
powers granted under said Constitution, is unconstitutional, null 
and void. 

2. Resolved, That the schedule attached to said ordinance 
suspending and prohibiting the election of members of Congress 
from this State to the House of Representatives of the Congress 
of the United States, required by law to be held on the 4th 
Thursday of this month, is a manifest usurpation of power to 
which we as Virginia freemen ought not, cannot and will not 
submit. 



254 THE RENDI]:^G OF VIRGINIA. 

3. Resolved. That the Convention of the 24th of April. 1861, 
between the commissioners of the Confederate States and this 
State, and the ordinance of the 25th of April. 1861, approving 
and ratifying said Convention, in agreement by which the whole 
military power and military operations, offensive and defensive, 
of the Commonwealth were placed under the chief control and 
direction of the President of the Confederate States, upon the 
same principle and footing as if the Commonwealth were now 
a member of said Confederacy and all the actings and doings 
of the executive officers of our State under and in pursuance of 
said agreement and ordinance, are plain and palpable violations 
of the constitution of our State and are utterly .subversive of 
the rights and liberties of the good people thereof. 

4. Resolved. That it be earnestly recommended to our fel- 
low-citizens of this State at the approaching election to vindicate 
their rights as Virginia freemen by voting against said ordi- 
nance of secession and all other measures of like character so 
far as they may be known to them. 

5. Resolved. That it be also urged upon them to vote for 
members of Congress of the United States in their several dis- 
tricts, in the exercise of the rights secured to us by the Con- 
stitution of the United States and of Virginia. 

6. Resolved. That it be also recommended to the citizens 
of the several counties to vote at said election for such persons 
as may entertain the opinions expressed in the foregoing resol- 
utions as members of the House of Delegates of our State. 

7. Resolved. That it is the imperative duty of our citizens 
to maintain the Constitution and the laws made in pursuance 
thereof and all officers thereunder acting in the lawful discharge 
of their respective duties. 

8. Resolved. That, in the language of General Washington 
in his letter of the 17 th of September, 1787, to the President of 
Congress, "in all our deliberations on this subject we keep 
steadily in view that which appears to us the greatest interest 
of every true American, the consolidation of our Union, in which 
is involved our property, felicity, safety and perhaps our na- 
tional existence." Therefore, we will maintain and defend the 
Constitution of the United States and the laws made in pur- 
suance thereof and all officers acting thereunder in the lawful 
discharge of their respective duties. 



THE MAY CONVENTION. 255 

CAELILE PROPOSES IMMEDIATE SEPARATION. 

Mr. Carlile said that, with a view of ascertaining and 
harmonizing- the sentiments of the Convention, he had 
drawn up a resolution which he desired to submit. He 
understood he thought one thing at least, that it was the 
unanimous determination of this body to consent under no 
circumstances to their transfer to the so-called Southern 
Confederacy. The only diversity amongst them was as to (he 
means of resistance — the means by which this determina- 
tion could be made effectual. Of course, the proposition 
he should submit would come with no authoritative expres- 
sion of opinion, but just as if emanating from any other 
member of the body. It was, however, the result of many 
long and well-considered and well-matured opinions and 
convictions. They were given shape and form this morn- 
ing after a night spent without sleep. Mr. Carlile read his 
resolution as follows: 

Resolved. That the Committee on State and Federal Rela- 
tions be instructed to report an ordinance declaring that the 
connection of the counties in this State composing the Tenth and 
Eleventh Congressional districts, to which shall be added the 
county of Wayne, with the other portions of the State is hereby 
dissolved, and that the people of the said counties are in the 
full possession and exercise of all the rights of sovereignty 
which belong and appertain to a free and independent State in 
the United States and subject to the Constitution thereof: and 
that the said Committee be instructed to report a consitution 
and form of government for said State, to be called the State 
of New Virginia; and also that they report a declaration of the 
causes which have impelled the people of the said counties thus 
to dissolve their connection with the rest of the State, together 
with an ordinance declaring that said constitution and form of 
government shall take effect and be an act of this day when 



256 THE KENDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

the consent of the Congress of the United States and of the 
Legislature of the State of Virginia is obtained, as provided for 
by Section 3, Article IV of the Constitution of the United 
States. 

AND OPENS THE DEBATE. 

Mr. Carlile was about to proceed with an explanation 
when he was called to order by Mr. Willey, who raised the 
i^oint that every proposition like this must be referred 
without debate or further explanation. 

Mr. Carlile replied that they had adopted a resolution 
in the Richmond Convention by which all resolutions 
touching Federal relations were to be referred "without 
debate ;" and yet the Convention was engaged for weeks 
in the discussion of resolutions of instruction to that com- 
mittee. This was a resolution of instruction ; and even if 
it were but one of inquiry, the resolution adopted yester- 
day did not prevent debate on it. There were very good 
precedents for the course he proposed. 

COLOXKL WHEAT PROTESTS. 

Mr. Wheat regretted Mr. Carlile should try to fore- 
stall the action of the Convention. The resolution in- 
structed the committee to make a specific report involving 
questions of great magnitude, instructing the committee 
to report an ordinance to establish an independent govern- 
ment within the State of Virginia. He presumed the Con- 
vention was not unprepared to meet that question, but this 
was not the proper mode by which to do so. 

Mr. Carlile said, with a view to conciliation and har- 
mony, he would put his resolution in the shape of one of 
inquiry. 



THE MAY CONVE^^TION. 257 

GENERAL JACKSON WILL NOT STAND IT. 

General Jackson said if this proposition was to be 
entertained for a moment, he would take his hat and leave 
{he hall, and the delegation from Wood would go with 
him. General Jackson had moved an adjournment but 
had withdrawn it to permit Colonel Wheat to speak. He 
now insisted on his motion to adjourn. 

The chair ruled that Mr. Carlile was entitled to ex- 
plain his resolution to be submitted to the committee. 
General Jackson did not execute his threat to leave the 
Convention. 

Mr. Carlile, resuming, said that it was due to a correct 
understanding on the part of the country and to the posi- 
tion he occupied before the country, that he be permitted 
to make an explanation. 

■ It is represented, he said, that a proposition looking to a 
separate State government is revolutionary. I deny it. It is 
the only legal, constitutional remedy left this people if they do 
not approve of the action of the Virginia Convention. Like the 
gentleman from Monongalia, I desire to exhaust all legal and 
peaceful remedies before we are compelled to the ultima ratio of 
nations. But can there be anything revolutionary in availing 
ourselves of the constitutional means provided in the organic 
law of the land for the very purpose of protecting our interests? 
The Constitution of the United States is also the constitution of 
Virginia; is the supreme law of the land; is to be obeyed and 
respected by all, even by the constitutions of the several States. 
It makes null and void every constitutional provision of a State 
and every Legislative enactment which is in conflict with it. 
It provides expressly and in terms plain and unmistakable for 
the separation of a State and the erection of a new State within 
the boundaries of a State out of which the new State is to be 
formed. Then where is there anything revolutionary in discuss- 
ing and deliberating, and exercising a privilege thus secured to 

Va,-17 



258 THE EENDING OF VIEGINIA. 

US by that instrument? Gentlemen are endeavoring to evade 
the issue by attempting to excite the fears of men by stigmatiz- 
ing the exercise of a plain and constitutional right as revolu- 
tionary. It is a peaceful, legal, constitutional remedy, secured 
to us by the same instrument which secures us freedom of 
speech and the right of trial by jury; nor is there anything 
in this right inconsistent with what gentlemen are pleased 
to term their "allegiance" to either the State or Federal 
government. There is no "treason" as gentlemen would en- 
deavor to impress; no perjury, as they have attempted to 
assume. 

It has been said this Convention was called for consulta- 
tion. It happened to be the speaker's pride that he had had the 
honor to draw up the preamble and resolutions adopted by the 
meeting in his own county which had resulted in the bringing 
together of this Convention. Every meeting which had ap- 
pointed delegates was held in response to those resolutions. 
Those resolves, among other things, say that this Convention 
was called "to consult and determine upon such action as the 
people of Northwestern Virginia should take in the present fear- 
ful emergency." That is the call and such is our duty. It con- 
templated "action" that would keep us in the Union and pre- 
serve to us and to our children, and to all posterity, the liberties 
achieved by the illustrious dead. * * * It is said we are not 
prepared for such action. When will we be better prepared? 
If this action be our constitutional right, who will dare to say 
that anywhere within the limits of this Union any man is 
authorized to resist such action? Who dare to say that this 
remedy can be exercised only by virtue of force? We will never 
be in a state of preparation if we are not now. What means of 
defense or protection are we likely to have in the next six 
months that we have not to-day? 

Colonel Wheat made the point of order that Mr. Car- 
lile by extending his remarks beyond what is known as an 
explanation was arguing the merits of the proposition con- 
tained in his resolution, and opening the door to general 



THE MAY CONVENTION. 259 

debate while denying to other members the right to reply 
to his arguments, thus forestalling the independent action 
of the committee. 

Mr. Carlile said he had been explaining the first and 
most important branch of his resolution, which is the 
peaceful, constitutional right of this separation, as he had 
shown by authority. Any gentleman had the same right 
to discuss the question that he had. 

The chair thought Mr. Carlile was now out of order ; 
and Mr. Carlile proceeded to say that he would try to con- 
fine himself to an explanation. The resolution, he said, 
does not contemplate that all action shall be deferred until 
the country gets into a better state of preparation. He 
asked when we would be better prepared to avail ourselves 
of this constitutional right than now? "After the 23d 
of this month," he said, "it may not be a constitutional 
right. We will have been transferred to the Southern 
Confederacy; and the Constitution of the United States 
under the theory of those who advocate this doctrine of 
withdrawing from the Union at will, will no longer shelter 
and support us ; and if every member of the Legislature of 
Virginia and every man, woman and child in the State 
were willing for our separation, the separation could not 
be made without the consent of the Montgomery govern- 
ment ; and that could be obtained only by treaty and nego- 
tiations by ministers on the part of the two governments, 
hostile as they are and as they may remain ; and no treaty 
negotiations can ever be had until the hostility ceases and 
the Southern Confederacy is recognized by the government 
of the United States." 



260 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

At this point, William Lazear, of Monongalia, inter- 
rupted to say that it would certainly be better to leave the 
discussion of this until the report of the committee. The 
chair said he felt compelled to arrest the discussion nowj 
and soon thereafter the Convention took a recess. 

REPORT FROM THE COMMITTEE. 

On reassembling in the afternoon, George McC. Porter, 
of Hancock, reported on behalf of the Committee on State 
and Federal Relations a series of resolutions comprising 
those offered in the morning with the addition of the fol- 
lowing : 

Resolved, That in view of the geographical, social, com- 
mercial and industrial interests of Northwestern Virginia, we 
pronounce the policy of the Convention in changing the relation 
of the State to the P'ederal Government and annexing us to the 
Confederate States unwise and utterly ruinous and disastrous 
to all the material interests of our section, severing all of our 
social ties and drying up all the channels of our trade and 
prosperity. 

Resolved, That should the ordinance of secession be adopted, 
then we recommend to the several counties here represented and 
all others disposed to cooperate with us to hold elections at 
the several precincts therein on the 4th day of June, 1861, for 
delegates to a general convention to be held at Wheelins on the 
11th day of June, 1861, to devise such measures and take such 
action as the safety and welfare of Virginia may demand; each 
county to appoint a number of representatives to said conven- 
tion equal to double the number to which it will be entitled in 
the next House of Delegates; and that the Senators and dele- 
gates to be elected on the 23rd inst. to the next General As- 
sembly of Virginia by the counties referred to be declared mem- 
bers of said convention. 

Resolved, That inasmuch as it is a conceded political axiom 
that government is founded on the consent of the governed and 



THE MAY CONVENTION. 261 

is instituted for their good, and it cannot be denied that the 
course pursued by the ruling power in the State is utterly sub- 
versive and destructive of our interests, we believe we may 
rightfully and successfully appeal to the proper authorities of 
Virginia to permit us peacefully and lawfully to separate from 
the residue of the State and form ourselves into a government 
to give effect to the wishes, views and interests of our con- 
stituents. 

Resolved, That the public authorities be assured that the 
people of the Northwest will exert their utmost power to pre- 
serve the peace, which they feel satisfied they can do, until an 
opportunity is afforded to see if our present difficulties cannot 
receive a peaceful solution; and we express the earnest hope 
that no troops of the Confederate States be introduced among 
us as we believe it would be eminently calculated to produce 
Civil War. 

Resolved. That ************* be 
appointed a committee to prepare an address to the people of 
Virginia in conformity with the foregoing resolutions and cause 
the same to be published and circulated as extensively as pos- 
sible. 

Mr. Carlile moved to recommit the report with instruc- 
tions; and after reading the resolution which he had of- 
fered in the morning, proceeded to address the Convention 
at considerable length, urging that some action be taken 
more effective that the mere adoption of resolutions. 

THE SPECTEE OF TREASON. 

He was followed and replied to by Mr. Willey, who 
said the proposition brought forward by Mr. Carlile 
was in violation of the law ; that it was treason not only 
against the constitution of Virginia but against the Con- 
stitution of the United States ; and that the action proposed 
would of necessity bring on war in our midst. 



262 THE BENDING OF VIKGINIA. 

At the opening of the third day's session, Mr. Carlile 
obtained leave to add to the resolution offered by him the 
day before, a provision that the ordinance therein pro- 
posed should be submitted to the people at the election to 
be held on the 23d inst. 

A member whose name the reporters did not get of- 
fered for reference a resolution suggesting the propriety 
of adopting the present constitution and laws of Virginia 
and recommending the election of delegates to a Conven- 
tion to revise the constitution and organize a separate 
State ; that the Convention at once organize a provisional 
government by choosing three persons to constitute a com- 
mittee of safety, who should exercise the constitutional 
powers of the Governor and Council of Virginia until a 
complete reorganization could be effected ; and requesting 
the Federal government to establish a line of military posts 
from Harper's Ferry up the Shenandoah Valley through 
to the Tennessee line and up the great Kanawha. The 
reading of the resolution excited considerable merriment. 

TRIPLE-PLATED TREASON. 

Mr. Willey now obtained the floor and proceeded to 
address the Convention. He opposed the organization of 
a provisional government. The plan of procedure pro- 
posed by Mr. Carlile, he said, would be "treason against 
the State government, the government of the United States, 
and against the government of the Confederate States of 
America." He urged that it would inevitably bring war 
and ruin upon this part of the State. He protested against 
such action and asked for the mode of redress proposed in 
the resolutions of the committee. He would never lend 



THE MAY CONVENTION. 263 

himself to an insurrectionary or unconstitutional means 
of accomplishing an object which he thought could be ac- 
complished according to law. 

Daniel Polslev, of Mason, spoke in favor of separa- 
tion. He was not terrified by the cry of "treason" that 
had been raised here. If there was any treason in the 
matter, they had already committed it. He held they had 
a right to establish a provisional government here for the 
entire State. 

John J. Jackson, Jr., moved that the Convention go 
into secret session. Mr. Peirpoiilt hoped this would not 
be done. Mr. Carlile was willing to vote for the proposi- 
tion if deemed advisable. John E. Hubbard spoke against 
it. It would be but imitating the star-chamber Convention 
at Richmond. General Jackson wanted the motion with- 
drawn. Mr. Burdett trusted it would not be withdrawn. 
He believed in fighting the devil with fire and favored go- 
ing into secret session. 

Mr. Jackson withdrew the motion ; and Mr. Peirpoint 
obtaining the floor addressed the Convention in favor of 
the plan proposed by the committee, and in opposition to 
the plan proposed by Mr. Carlile. In the course of his re- 
marks, referring to Mr. Carlile, he said it seemed all other 
gentlemen were to be driven from the field. 

Mr. Carlile protested that nothing he had either said 
or done warranted any such remark. 

Mr. Peirpoint said there would soon be any amount 
of men and money here to protect Union men in l^orth- 
western Virginia. Mr. Carlile asked him to give his au- 
thority for the statement. Mr. Peirpoint was about to do 
so, but on suggestion of several gentlemen refrained. Mr. 
Carlile said he did not ask out of any doubt as to the 



264 THE REXDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

truthfulness of the statement. He had understood ]\[r. 
Peirpoint to mention it as a mere suj)position. He added 
that it had been charged that he had been at Washington 
recently engaged in procuring arms and that the 2000 
rifles now here had been obtained through him. These 
arms, he said, had been procured by a delegation from 
Brooke County. 

PEIRPOINT IS PIQUED. 

Mr. Peirpoint had alluded to manifestations on the 
part of the spectators while he was speaking as "an out- 
side pressure," and said they were endeavoring by such 
expressions to intimidate the gentlemen in the 
Convention. Colonel Wheat at this rose and said 
he had lived here all his life and knew well the temper of 
his fellow-citizens in this city. He was sure Mr. Peirpoint 
did them injustice. In the afternoon session, Peirpoint 
expressed his regret that he should have exhibited any un- 
due warmth in his morning remarks and apologized for it. 

During the afternoon, Mr. Carlile submitted as a fur- 
ther amendment to his proposition the following: 

And that said Committee also provide in the event of the 
ratification of the ordinance of secession for the assembling of 
this Convention on the first Monday in June next to adopt a 
constitution and form of government for the said counties, if 
in their opinion it is premature at this time to adopt said con- 
stitution and form of government. 

Mr. Carlile said he offered this in deference to the 
views of others, not that he had in the least changed his 
own opinion heretofore expressed. 

Mr. Latham offered a series of resolutions, as a kind 
of middle ground. They went to the committee, but did 
not get into the hands of the reporters. 



THE MAY COXVEXTION, 265 

THE DOGS OF WAE. 

In the even i 112: session Mr. Burdett read a telegram 
from his town saying : "The dogs of war are about ; look 
ont for State troops." He expected a letter by night train 
aivino- him details. Ever since the assemblina: of the Con- 
vention he had tried to impress upon them his conviction 
that before the 23d of the month more of the Xorthwest 
not already so occupied would be visited by Southern 
troops. The Baltimore Sun had intimated that Virginia 
intended sending out here five thousand troops, but had 
been advised by an officer of the Confederate government 
not to do so. He had thought that perhaps he was the 
only crazy man in this body, but he believed the Conven- 
tion would see within twenty-four hours the necessity for 
immediate action. 

John J. Jackson, Jr., said he was not afraid of Letch- 
er's dogs of war. Let them come and they would get a 
warm reception. 

At 5 p. M. the Committee on State and Federal Rela- 
tions not being ready to report, the Convention was ad- 
dressed by George R. Latham, of Taylor. 

On reassembling at 7 p. m., Campbell Tarr, chairman 
of the committee, presented their report as follows : 

THE COMMITTEE SUMS UP. 

Resolved. That in our deliberate judgment the ordinance 
passed by the Convention of Virginia on the 17th of April, 1861, 
known as the ordinance of secession, by which said Convention 
undertook in the name of the State of Virginia to repeal the 
ratification of the Constitution of the United States by this 
State and to resume all the rights and powers granted under 
said Constitution, is unconstitutional, null and void. 



266 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

Resolved, That the schedule attached to said ordinance sus- 
pending and prohibiting the elections of members of Congress 
for this State, is a manifest usurpation of power to which we 
ought not to submit. 

Resolved, That the agreement on the 24th of April, 1861, be- 
tween the commissioners of the Confederate States and this 
State, and the ordinance of the 25th of April, 1861, approving 
and ratifying said agreement, by which the whole military 
force and military operations, offensive and defensive, of this 
Commonwealth are placed under the chief control and direction 
of the President of the Confederate States upon the same 
principles, basis and footing as if the Commonwealth were now 
a member of said Confederacy, and all acts of the executive 
officers of our State in pursuance of said agreement and ordi- 
nance, are plain and palpable violations of the Constitution of 
the United States and are utterly subversive of the rights and 
liberties of the people of Virginia. 

Resolved, That we earnestly urge and entreat the citizens 
of the State everywhere, but more especially in the Western 
section, to be prompt at the polls on the 23rd inst. and to impress 
upon every voter the duty of voting in condemnation of the 
ordinance of secession, in the hope that we may not be involved 
in the ruin to be occasioned by its adoption and with a view to 
demonstrate the position of the West on the question of seces- 
sion. 

Resolved, That we earnestly recommend to the citizens of 
Western Virginia to vote for members of the Congress of the 
United States in their several districts, in the exercise of the 
right secured to us by the Constitution of the United States 
and of the State of Virginia. 

Resolved, That we also recommend to the citizens of the 
several counties to vote at said election for such persons as en- 
tertain the opinions expressed in the foregoing resolutions for 
members of the Senate and House of Delegates of our State. 

Resolved, That in view of the geographical, social, com- 
mercial and industrial interests of Northwestern Virginia, this 
Convention are constrained in giving expression to the opinion 
of their constituents to declare that the Virginia Convention in 
assuming to change the relations of the State of Virginia to the 



THE MAY CONVENTION. 267 

Federal government have not only acted unwisely and uncon- 
stitutionally but have adopted a policy utterly ruinous to all 
the material interests of our section, severing all our social 
ties and drying up all the channels of our trade and prosperity. 

Resolved, That in the event of the ordinance of secession 
being ratified by a vote, we recommend to the people of the 
counties here represented, and all others disposed to co-operate 
with us, to appoint on the 4th day of June, 1861, delegates to a 
general convention to meet on the 11th of that month, 1861, at 
such place as may be designated by the committee hereinafter 
provided, to devise such measures and take such action as the 
safety and welfare of the people they represent may demand, 
each county to appoint a number of representatives to said con- 
vention equal to double the number to which it will be entitled 
in the next House of Delegates, and the senators and delegates 
to be elected on the 23rd inst. by the counties referred to, to 
the next General Assembly of Virginia and who concur in the 
views of this Convention, to be entitled to seats in said Conven- 
tion as members thereof. 

Resolved. That inasmuch as it is a conceded political axiom 
that government is founded on the consent of the governed and 
is instituted for their good, and it cannot be denied that the 
course pursued by the ruling power in the State is utterly sub- 
versive and destructive of our interests, we believe we may right- 
fully and successfully appeal to the proper authorities of Vir- 
ginia to permit us peaceably and lawfully to separate from the 
residue of the State and form ourselves into a government to 
give effect to the wishes, views snd interests of our constituents. 

Resolved, That the public authorities be assured that the 
people of the Northwest will exert their utmost power to pre- 
serve the peace, which they feel satisfied they can do, until an 
opportunity is offered to see if our present difficulties cannot 
receive a peaceful solution; and we express the earnest hope 
that no troops of the Confederate States will be introduced 
among us, as we believe it would be eminently calculated to 
produce Civil War. 

Resolved, That, in the language of Washington in his letter 
of the 17th September, 1787, to the President of Congress: "In 
all our deliberations on this subject we have kept steadily in 



268 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

view that which appears to us the greatest interest of every true 
American, the consolidation of our Union, in which is involved 
our prosperity, felicity, safety and perhaps our National exist- 
ence," And therefore we will maintain and defend the Con- 
stitution of the United States and the laws made in pursuance 
thereof and all officers acting thereunder, in the lawful dis- 
charge of their respective duties. 

Resolved, That ************* i^q 
<i Central Committee, to attend to all matters connected with the 
objects of this Convention, and that they have power to assemble 
this Convention at any time they may think necessary 

Resolved. That the Central Committee be instructed to pre- 
pare an address to the people of Virginia in conformity with 
the foregoing resolutions, and cause the same to be published 
and circulated as extensively as possible. 

NO TIME TO DELIBERATE. 

The report having been read, and the hour being late, 
Daniel Polslev, of Mason, suggested that instead of acting 
on it to-night it be laid on the table and printed, in order 
that every member might have an opportnnitj to ex- 
amine it. 

GENERAL JACKSON^S CORN-PLANTING. 

To this General Jackson objected. He wanted to go 
• home. It was corn-planting time. 

Mr. Carlile said he was satisfied nothing more than 
was now incorporated in the report could be obtained 
from the Convention at this time; and he was happy to 
state that since the evening adjournment a resolution had 
been adopted by the committee which he regarded worth 
all the rest and which would in a short time realize all 
their hopes of a !New Virginia, He referred to the resolu- 
tion providing for the appointment of a committee posses- 
sing all the powers this Convention could exercise so far as 
thev could be exercised bv a committee. 



THE MAY CONVENTION. 269 

REPORT ADOPTED. 

The question was then pnt on the adoption of the re- 
port and there appeared to be but two dissenting voices. 
The announcement that the report had been adopted was 
received with tremendous cheering. 

CENTRAL COMMITTEE. 

The Central Committee provided for in the report 
were announced by the chair as follows : John S. Carlile, 
James S. Wheat, Francis H. Peirpoint, Campbell Tarr, 
George R. Latham, Andrew Wilson, S. H. Woodward, 
James W. Paxton. 

FIRE-WORKS. 

Several gentlemen were called for and speeches were 
made from the stage by General Jackson, Carlile, Willey, 
Peirpoint and others. Mr. Carlile in the course of his 
remarks expressed the belief that "upon us of Western 
Virginia and upon our efforts depends to a very great 
extent the restoration of harmony to the whole of our be- 
loved land" and the preservation of its institutions. He 
believed that preservation was to be secured by and 
through "the agency of this portion of Virginia — by and 
through the erection of a new State." 

Mr. Willey, in his address, declared his willingness to 
lay his life on the altar of his country.' He said his 
"soundness on this question" had been "misapprehended 
in this good city of yours," while in fact his constitution 
had been broken "bv the anxiety of the struggle of the last 



270 THE KENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

two and a half months for the perpetuity of that very 
Union for a want of fidelity to which I am suspected at 
this time." When the laws and the Constitution should 
fail and "the great legitimate agency of republican liberty 
is not sufficient to bring about the revolution that is to 
secure us our just rights at the ballot-box," he was "ready 
to stand among the foremost of those here to-day to sus- 
pect me." He thought if they could have two weeks longer 
until the election, they could "knock the ordinance into a 
cocked hat." The first thing to do was to kill the ordi- 
nance on the 23d. He concluded with a poetical quotation 
about the flag ("Forever float that standard sheet," etc.) 
that brought down the house. 

Prayer was then offered, the Star-Spangied Banner 
sung, and, with cheers "for the Union," the Convention 
adjourned, as the newspaper report of the day said, "in a 
blaze of enthusiasm." 



WHO DID IT ? 

Long after this Convention and other conventions had 
done their work — ^when the work itself had been approved 
and had proven successful beyond the most sanguine an- 
ticipation — it became a question : Who had struck the first 
spark from the flint? Who was entitled to the credit of 
first suggesting the constituent Convention which met in 
June and took up the work of reorganizing the government 
of Virginia? It was claimed for John H. Atkinson, of 
Hancock, that the eighth resolution in the report of the 
committee, substantially as it appeared in the report, hadi 



THE MAY CONVENTION. 271 

been first dra^^Ti bv him. Mr. Atkinson's biographer in 
^'Prominent Men" states that "if the papers of the Con- 
vention are still in existence, the original of the resolution 
as it appears in the committee's report will be found in 
Mr. Atkinson's hand- writing." Governor Peirpoint, who 
was a member of the committee, in a letter to Senator Wil- 
ley, to be referred to more particularly again, says this 
resolution was drawn by himself. The original papers 
ought to be among the archives of the Restored Govern- 
ment at Richmond. Judge Cranmer, of Wheeling, who 
was one of the secretaries of the May Convention and re- 
tained the papers, and secretary of the June Convention 
also, sent the papers of these bodies to Alexandria, by 
Governor Peirpoint's direction, when the archives of the 
Restored Government were removed thither. As recently 
as l^ovember, 1901, the author tried to obtain from the 
Secretary of the Commonwealth at Richmond the original 
of this resolution or a photograph of it, but was not suc- 
cessful. 

REVIEW BY ''archie"" CAMPBELL. 

In the Wheeling Intelligencer of April 14, 1897, ap- 
peared an article of several columns written by A. W. 
Campbell, former editor of that paper, describing a two- 
days' visit with Governor Peirpoint, at his home in Fair- 
mont, and detailing conversations with him, relating al- 
most wholly to the historical episode of 1861 in which the 
Governor bore an important part. Mr. Campbell states 
that Peirpoint early made up his mind that the people 
of Western Virginia must find refuge, if anywhere, under 



272 THE REXDIXO OF VIRGINIA. 

the 4tli section of Article IV of the Constitution of the. 
United States, which reads: "The United States shall 
guarantee to every State in this Union a republican form 
of government and shall protect each of them against in- 
vasion and, on application of the Legislature, or of the 
executive when the Legislature cannot be convened, against 
domestic violence." Mr. Campbell does not, however, fur- 
ther elucidate Peirpoint's idea, if the latter had then fol- 
lowed it out to the result afterwards reached. The vital 
prerequisite to an application of tliis article was a Legis- 
lature and executive who would be recognized by the Presi- 
dent and Congress. This was the basic concept of the 
Western organization ; and the first suggestion leading up 
to this seems to have come from John D. Nichols, of Wells- 
burg, so far as indicated by anything made public. Mr. 
Campbell says Peirpoint brought his idea to the May Con- 
vention, but was disappointed to find it did not impress 
others as it did him, doubtless for the simple reason that 
he was not yet able to show how it could be made avail- 
able. 

WILLEY^S TRIPLE TREASON. 

In the course of his article, Mr. Campbell makes Mr. 
Willey's "triple-treason" speech in the May Convention 
the subject of the following comment: 

Perhaps it was Mr. Willey's remarkable speech early in the 
May sitting that made the committee and the Convention cau- 
tious as to the exact verbiage of their final address to the people. 
He made what was known then and ever since as a "triple- 
treason" speech. That is, he in antagonism to Mr. Carlile and 
all the rampant element warned the delegates that they were 



AN OLD FUED RECALLED. 273 

about to commit "triple-treason" — treason to the United States, 
treason to Jolin Letcher & Company and treason to the Southern 
Confederacy, into which Confederacy Virginia had been merged 
on the 25th of April by the Virginia State Government in ad- 
vance of a popular vote on the ordinance of secession. 

That remarkable speech of Mr. Willey's threw a chill over 
the. delegates and over the people who thronged the lobbies. It 
was construed as the advocacy of a do-nothing policy; as mean- 
ing that everybody's neck and everybody's property would be at 
their own risk if they did aught more than vote against the 
ordinance. Never did a man do himself greater injustice than 
did Mr. Willey in that particular utterance. In a subsequent 
speech he complained that he had been misunderstood, misin- 
terpreted, and even suspected of disloyalty to the Union cause, 
in reference to which suspicion he avowed his willingness to 
lay down his life for the Union. But to this day, no one has 
ever satisfactorily explained to that audience how the people 
of Western Virginia could commit treason to the United States 
and to the Southern Confederacy at one and the same time. 

WILLEY BRINGS UP HIS RESERVES. 

Mr. Willoy seems to have felt restive under tl;is treat- 
ment of the matter; for four (hiys aftcn- this appeared he 
addressed a letter to the InteUigeneer statin"' that in July, 
18()6, he wrote to Governor Peirpoint, then in the execu- 
tive chair at Richmond, "askine; if he wonld have any 
objection to give me a statement of his personal recollec- 
tion of the proceedings at said mass-meeting and especially 
if he remembered how I came to be present on that occa- 
sion and what part T took in said proceedings." Governor 
Peirpoint replied, with permission to publish; but Mr. 
Willey says he laid the letter aside "reserving it for ]mb- 
lication whensoever an appro]n"iate occasion should lu-e- 
sent itself." Evidently conceiving that the occasion had 

Va.-18 



27-i THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

arrived, Mr. Willey now transmitted a copy of the Gov- 
ernor's letter, and it was printed in the InteUigencer im- 
mediately following liis own. 

PEIEPOINT GIVES CERTIFICATE. 

Governor Peirpoint begins the letter by stating that a 
few days before the meeting of the May Convention he 
met Mr, Willey at Fairmont, who had been at or was going 
to Farmington to see his father 'Svlio was then very ill or 
thought to be at the point of death." The Convention be- 
came the topic of conversation and there was a concurrence 
of opinion adverse to "the project to be proj^osed by Mr, 
Carlile" — concerning which it thus appears these gentle- 
men were informed, in advance of the public, for nothing 
had then been disclosed regarding any plan of Mr. Car- 
lile's beyond what appeared in the Clarksburg call : "To 
consult and determine upon such action as the people of 
ISTorthwestern Virginia should take in the present fearful 
emergency." "From the state of your health," Mr. Peir- 
point says, "you thought it out of the question to attend 
the Wheeling Convention ; that nothing but aifection, or 
perhaps the last tribute to your aged father, had induced 
you to leave home at that time. You had with great pain 
traveled from Morgantown to Fairmont. You looked so 
weak that I thought it almost wrong to urge your attend- 
ance; but I knew that Mr. Carlile had the prestige of 
calling the Convention, and the prominence he had gained 
at Richmond would make his influence great among the 
members, and I fully appreciated the importance of de- 
feating his project. You concurred and you attended the 
Convention with health little improved." 



PEIRPOINT VS. ATKIXSOX. 275 

PEIKPOINT CLAIMS THE AUTIIOESHIP. 

Concerning what transpired in the Convention, Gov- 
ernor Peirpoint continues : 

Daniel Lamb, George McC. Porter and myself were made a 
sub-committee of the Committee on State and Federal Relations 
to make a report on the resolutions submitted. Lamb and 
Porter took the resolutions and I made out the report of the 
Committee. I drew up the resolution providing for a conven- 
tion to assemble on the 11th day of June, fixing the representa- 
tion, providing for an executive committee and also requiring 
the executive committee to appoint a central committee in each 
county to superintend and certify the election of delegates to 
the Convention. These resolutions I read to Lamb and Porter, 
and put them in my pocket. They were not reported to the 
Convention by the Committee. The time, in my opinion, had 
not arrived for their presentation to the Convention. 

SO DOES JOHN H. ATKINSON. 

The resolution thus described by Peirpoint as having 
been drawn by him providing for the June Convention is 
tlie one claimed to have been written by Mr. Atkinson. 
Not content to leave the matter in doubt, I wrote to Mr. 
Atkinson, still living at J^ew Cumberland, and received 
reply under date of May 7, 1900, in which he says: 

It is true that in the May Convention at Wheeling, in 1861, 
I drafted the resolution of which you .write. Probably no more 
determined body of men ever met to consult of their duties than 
those who assembled in the hall opposite the McLure House. 
Their earnestness gave rise to much difference of opinion — some 
bold, some irresolute, but all anxious to meet the emergency of 
the hour. Some favored a new State by cutting loose at once 
from Old Virginia. Others feared a double treason — treason 
against the Union and treason aga'nst Virginia. 



276 



THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 




John H. Atkinson. 



During the recess on the second day, the delegation from 
Hancock was called together, and I laid before them the follow- 
ing resolution, which was unanimously adopted and sent to 
George McC. Porter, our member upon the Committee. 

Mr, Atkinson then gives the resolution as it appears 
in the committee's report, and adds: 

This resolution was adopted by the Committee and laid 
before the Convention, where the blank dates were filled 
and adopted without a dissenting vote, and was printed upon 
the tickets we voted May 23, 1861. 

I had before laying this resolution before the delegates 
shown it to Daniel Polsley, an old friend who had long edited 
a paper in Brooke County. He assured me that it coincided 



WILLEY^S TREASON SCARECROW. 277 

with his views and that he would advocate it in the Convention. 
[ do not remember to have seen the letter of Governor Peir- 
point in the Intelligencer ; but Campbell knew I was the author, 
and this was only one of many positions we took in common 
during the war. 

CARLILE GETS A CHILL. 

Let US pursue Governor Peirpoint's letter, leaving the 
question of the authorship of the resolution for the reader 
to determine with these opposing statements before him. 
He proceeds to describe the proceedings of the Conven- 
tion, including Mr. Willey's address on the third day 
warning the members that Mr. Carlile's programme would 
be treasonable. Before the opening on the third day Peir- 
point learned, he says, that a canvass of the delegations 
made the night before and that morning showed three- 
fourths of the delegations in favor of ''Carlile's project." 
Mr, Willey's speech that morning was followed by ad- 
dresses by Tarr and Polsley, and they by Peirpoint, who 
went upon the stage and spoke an hour and a quarter. 
"After dinner," says the Governor, "I proceeded with 
my remarks, but I had not spoken more than ten minutes 
when Mr. Carlile came and proposed to withdraw his sub- 
stitute and recommit the whole subject to the committee 
on resolutions, which was agreed to." * * * "During 
the recess the same parties who had taken the sense of the 
delegations in the morning again canvassed the delega- 
tions and found they were then as strongly opposed to 
Mr. Carlile's project as they had been in favor of it in the 
morning." The Governor leaves it open to doubt whose 
speech it was — or whether all — that had wrought the 



278 THE REXDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

change. But Mr. Willey, in printing the Governor's let- 
ter, appropriates the credit hy here interjecting between 
parentheses an extract from a letter from Hon. George K. 
Latham, who wrote from the House of Representatives 
July 20, 1S6G : 

Having had the honor of a seat in the Convention referred 
to and having been much interested in Mr. Carlile's proposition 
because opposed to it and fearing exceedingly the consequences 
of its adoption, I think I speak what I know when I say that 
upon the conclusion of Mr. Carlile's explanation of his proposi- 
tion two-thirds of the Convention regarded it with favor, and 
I am thoroughly convinced that a majority would have voted 
for it until after the very able argument, etc." — 

where Mr. Willey ends the quotation. But the preceding 
extract from Mr. Campbell indicates the fact correctly, I 
think, that ]\[r. Willey's speech holding up the spectre of 
treason had much to do with changing the feeling away 
from Carlile. It was a cold douche to the ardor of the 
Convention. 

Governor Peirpoint continues his recital : 

I met Mr. Carlile before he left the hall and showed him 
my resolution for the June convention. He declared it met his 
views and asked why I had not showed it to him before. I told 
him T had submitted the proposition to him the evening before 
the Convention assembled, but he would not agree to it. 

"When the committee reassembled in their room, T submitted 
to them for the first time the resolution calling for the June 
Convention. You were present and gave your hearty concur- 
rence to the project and suggested a single alteration. As soon 
as the attention of the committee was fixed on the subject of a 
convention to take place after the ordinance of secession should 
have been voted on it was agreed to without a dissenting voice. 
Mr. Carlile came into the committee room during the sitting 
and stated that he would withdraw his assent and should still 



JUNE PKOGRAMME IN EESEKVE. 279 

insist in the Convention on the adoption of his proposition. 
The resolutions as first reported, with some verbal amendments, 
were reported to the Convention, also the resolution calling 
for a future Convention. I believe they were concurred 
in by all the committee except Mr. Carlile. The committee of 
safety was also designated in the report, which the Convention 
adopted with great spirit. I believe there were but two dis- 
senting voices. 

I think it proper for me to state in this connection that the 
subject of a future convention was not discussed in the Conven- 
tion. Neither Mr. Porter nor Mr. Lamb had addressed the Con- 
vention. They were the only persons except myself that knew 
such a proposition would be made. I did not allude to it in my 
remarks to the Convention. I did not think the time had ar- 
rived for the presentation of the resolution to the Conventidn 
nor did I think it proper to allude to it. 

Mr. Carlile's proposition was opposed by you and myself 
purely on the ground that it was illegal and unconstitutional; 
that neither Congress nor the administration at Washington 
could sanction it; that we had neither State nor United States 
authority for such a proceeding; and that it would place all 
who participated in it in a false position, adding trouble to 
trouble, or, as you expressed it making triple-treason. 

Governor Peirpoint added the following postscript: 

It is due to you to say that I understand that immediately 
after the passage of the ordinance of secession you wrote to 
your constituents at Morgantown informing them that they must 
prepare for the worst — for resistance at all hazards — that there 
would be war. 

THE JUNE PKOGRAMME. 

Concerning the purposes of the June Convention, Mr. 
Campbell in the article detailing his conversations with 
Governor Peirpoint says : 

It had not been deemed best to announce in advance that 
the convention summoned to meet on the 11th of June would 
proceed to formally declare the government at Richmond dead 



280 THE RENDIjS-G of VIRGINIA. 

in office. The programme was for the June Convention to meet 
under an authorization of the people to tal^e such action as might 
be necessary to meet the exigencies — to prevent anarchy and 
protect life and property. Everybody, however, understood be- 
fore the election of June 4th that this meant the supersedure 
of the Richmond government. It meant that loyal Virginia was 
to invoke the political as well as the military aid of the United 
States under the 4th section of Article IV alluded to. 

A THIRTY-YEAR WAR. 

The peculiar thing about this correspondence between 
Governor Peirpoint and Mr, Willev, which must strike 
the reader when dates and other circumstances are con- 
sidered is that Mr. Willey should have asked the Governor 
for such a testimonial of good intentions — for that is what 
it amounts to ; and that having obtained it, he should have 
held it in reserve for more than thirty years, waiting ap- 
parently for somebody to attack him, as he evidently con- 
ceived Mr. Campbell had done in the "triple treason" ex- 
tract quoted in the foregoing. 

THE ORIGINAL RESTORER. 

Another interesting question, after the June Conven- 
tion had laid the groundwork for the reorganization of 
the State, was : Who had been first to suggest the theory of 
original rights in the people — the "legislative powers in- 
capable of annihilation," referred to in the Declaration of 
Independence, upon which the restoration of civil c-overn- 
ment rested ? Granville Parker claims it for John D. 
ITichols, a young lawyer of Wellsburg. Mr. Parker was 
told by Mr. TTichols that "in a private consultation by citi- 
zens of Brooke, Adam Kuhn, Joseph Gist, Campbell Tarr, 



THE GERM OF REORGAXIZATION. 281 

Nathaniel Wells, Daniel Palmer and himself present, and 
also Daniel Polsley, of Mason, he made this suggestion : 
that since Governor Letcher and other State officers, ad- 
hering to the pretended secession ordinance, had forfeited 
their powers, and the existing constitution made no pro- 
vision for such a case, the only way was to ask the people 
— the only source of power — to send delegates to a conven- 
tion with power to supply their places with loyal men ;" 
that the suggestion was approved by others present, and 
that it was put in shape by Daniel Polsley, who presented 
it to the meeting, which adopted it with unanimity and 
appointed delegates to the June Convention in pursuance 
of this idea. 



CHAPTEK IX. 

THE CENTRAL COMMITTEE— THE ELECTION— THE 
MILITARY JOINS THE ISSUE. 

THE WISDOM OF THE OONVENTION. 

Touching the work of the Convention, the Intelligencer 
of the 1 8th made this comment : 

The Committee in their final report struck exactly the 
happy medium that always lies between two extremes, and ac- 
complished, in our judgment, all that it was either prudent or 
possible for them to accomplish. Many of the members were 
firmly persuaded that an immediate severance of the loyal 
Northwest from the disloyal portions of the State was the only 
effectual way to stop the contagion of rebellion; in other words 
what the surgeons call a heroic policy. And this policy had some 
good reasons; but it had also its insuperable objections. * * * 
The one crowning feature is the Central Committee that it pro- 
vides for; and that committee has been made a power and a life 
by the kind of men who have been placed on it. All that could 
have been wisely accomplished by the Convention remaining in 
session for a month has been done in the resolutions and the or- 
ganization of the Central Committee. 

THE CENTRAL COMMITTEE EXHORT. 

The Central Committee went vigorously to work to get 
into communication with the county organizations and pre- 
pare tlie machinery for bringing out the full anti-secessioa 
vote on the 23d. They printed in the newspapers on the 
21st and scattered broadcast in pamphlet an address to the 



THE COMMITTEE APPEAL TO THE PEOPLE. 283 

people of Northwestern Virginia on the crisis. This docu- 
ment was more an exhortation than an argument. It 
conjured the people to enter at once upon the work of 
preparing their friends and neighbors for the stand to be 
taken against the usurpation at Richmond. ' They should 
not permit themselves to be dragged into a rebellion in- 
augurated by heartless and ambitious men banded together 
to destroy the government. Secession had been consum- 
mated in secret conclave by reckless men in contempt of 
the expressed will of the people; it meant bankruptcy, 
ruin, Civil War ending in military despotism. Business 
of every description was already paralyzed, all credit pros- 
trate. Secession in a word was war. It had been preceded 
and precipitated by acts of war, and the war was now upon 
them. It was their first duty to repudiate the tyrannical 
rule the Richrilond Convention was attempting to impose 
on them, and to resist the usurpation of the powers of the 
Commonwealth ; and to make resistance available, they 
were urged to act in the spirit of the resolutions adopted 
by the May Convention and accompanying this address. 
The Convention to assemble June 11th was looked to to 
organize their action; and they should take immediate 
steps to be represented in that body by their most resolute, 
temperate and wisest men. It was no time to stop and 
count costs when self-preservation was in issue. If they 
hesitated all would be lost. The paper did not attempt to 
argue the question of secession, but simply recognized the 
emergency already upon them which must be met at once. 
It was written by Mr. Carlile, in his most fervid tone of 
appeal, adapted to the then excited state of popular feel- 
ing. 



284 THE RENDING OF VIEGINIA. 

AND THEN AEGUE. 

Six days later, the committee issued another and more 
lengthy address, devoted chiefly to a discussion of the 
.legality of secession; concerning which the popular appre- 
hension was not then so clear as it became afterwards. As 
this matter has already been fully traversed in a preceding 
chapter, we will not follow the argument here, except to 
note that the committee laid emphasis on the fact that the 
Richmond Convention in their alliance with the Con- 
federate States, without waiting for the ratification of 
the act of secession by the people of Virginia, had not only 
violated the terms of the act of Assembly under which the 
Convention had been brought together, but had violated 
also two articles of the Virginia bill of rights, one of which 
declared that "the people have a right to a uniform govern- 
ment, and therefore no government separate from or inde- 
pendent of the government of Virginia ought to be erected 
or established within the limits thereof." The Conven- 
tion had undertaken to give the President of the Confed- 
erate States full and instant control of all power and oper- 
ations, civil and military, in the Commonwealth. It had 
thus transferred to a foreign power, so far as force could 
accomplish it, control over even the suffrage of the people 
of Virginia, and could thus force the ratification of seces- 
sion against their obvious will. 

THE MAY ELECTION. 

The general elections, including the vote on ratifying 
the ordinance of secession, occurred on the 23d. In the 
immediate ISTorthwest, the vote on the ordinance was 



THE VOTE ON THE ORDINANCE. 285 

nearly all one way. In the four Panhandle counties the 
majority against ratification was 6,397 ; in Ohio County 
alone 3,300; in twenty-five counties 13,378. In the re- 
moter southwestern counties the vote against ratification 
was light. It was dangerous to cast such a vote. The con- 
ditions in that region are illustrated by a statement made 
in .the Constitutional Convention whicli sat in Wheeling in 
the winter of 1801-62, by Robert Hagar, member from 
Boone County. The Convention was discussing the man- 
ner of voting, by ballot or viva voce : 

UNION VOTERS COERCED. 

In my own county, said Mr. Hagar, from personal acquaint- 
ance with nearly all the people in the county, I am convinced 
that if the mode of voting had been by ballot there would have 
been 100 to 150 votes against ratifying the ordinance of seces- 
sion. At the court-house, only one vote was so cast, and the 
man who cast it had great difficulty to get away with his life. 
It had been given out by the Secessionists before the election 
that any man who voted against secession should be hung forth- 
with. The Union men had agreed that some 40 or 50 of them 
would go to the polls at the court-house together and vote againsc 
ratification; but when they got there they found a drunken 
secession mob and their hearts failed them. At Big Coal River, 
in Kanawha, in February the vote was nearly unanimous for 
the Union candidates. In May, fully one third of it was for 
secession, through the influence of one of the ipadin.L' P5of>es?ior>- 
ists named William Thompson. At Chapmanville, in Logan 
County, only one man out of fifty Union men present had the 
courage to cast his vote, and he saved his life only by canceling 
the vote and having his name erased. 

It will be recalled that Virginia's method of voting 
"was viva voce. Mr. Hagar's statement shows how it oper- 
ated to reduce the vote against the ratification of the ordi- 
nance even where there was no Confederate soldiery; so 



286 THE KENDIXG OF VIRGIXIA. 

that "\vliatever the vote actually cast, there was a large 
suppression of it on one side, and the resnlt was not an 
exjDression of the will of the people of Virginia even in 
the West. The secession authorities at Richmond gave 
out the entire vote against ratification as only 32,134, most 
of that cast in the Xorthwest — the only part of the State 
^vhere the people were in any degree free to vote their sen- 
timents. 

In an address issued by the June Convention, after 
its adjournment over to August, is the following statement 
regarding the conduct of this election : 

Threats of personal injury and other intimidations * * * 
were used by the adherents of the conspirators in every county 
in the State. Judges charged the grand juries that opposition 
to disunion would be punished as treason against the Common- 
wealth; and the armed partisans of the conspirators in various 
places arrested, plundered and exiled peaceable citizens for no 
other crime than their adherence to the Union. * * * We are 
not apprised by any official announcement of the vote taken 
under such circumstances; but whatever the result may be, we 
denounce it as unfair and unjust and as affording no evidence 
of- the will of the people on the subject actually presented for 
their suffrages, and much less of their consent to their transfer 
to the self-constituted oligarchy of the South. * * * The 
men justly termed conspirators and usurpers because they can- 
not show you warrant for their acts, were when this Convention 
met practically in full possession of their branch of the govern- 
ment, and still claim the right to exercise their «surped powers. 

THE COURAGE OF HIS COXVICTIONS. 

Congressmen were voted for in the two distrie*^s in the 
Northwest, despite the order of the Richmond Convention 
forbidding it. In Ohio County, one Alexander M. Jacob, 
one of the justices of the county court, entered a protest 



THE FIRST BLOODSHED. 287 

against the action of the court in ordering books to be 
opened for the election of congressmen. Therein it must 
be admitted Mr. Jacob showed courage in adhering to the 
Southern Confederacy in the face of the very large adverse 
majority around him ; and this we are at liberty to admire 
in the abstract, whatever we may think of his patriotism or 
his judgment. 

SOUTHERN CONFEDERACY ARRIVES. 

On the day of the election Confederate troops to the 
number of about one thousand arrived at Webster from 
the South on their way to Grafton to rendezvous — "to de- 
fend the place," one of them said to a Wheeling gentleman 
who was at Webster, ''against Northern aggression." Al- 
ready there was a force of two hundred at Fetterman, 
including William P. Thompson's "Marion Guards;" and 
there in the evening of May 22d was shed probably 

THE FIRST BLOOD OF THE REBELLION. 

About 9 p. M., T. Bailey Brown was killed by W. S. 
Knight. Knight was one of the Confederate pickets sta- 
tioned on the line of the railroad at the eastern end of the 
town. Browm, in company with Daniel Wilson, who after- 
wards became a caj^tain in Colonel Latham's regiment, 
was returning from Pruntytown, where they had been or- 
ganizing a Union company. They were commanded by 
the picket to halt, and thereupon ensued a dispute ; and 
Brown, drawing his revolver, fired at the sentry and 
clipped his ear. Knight, who had an old-fashioned smooth- 
bore musket loaded with slugs, returned the fire. One of 



. 288 THE LENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

the slugs pierced Brown's heart and killed him instantly. 
Wilson turned and ran ; and, not unlike Achilles, received 
a shot in the heel of his boot. 

Ellsworth was killed at Alexandria early on the morn- 
ing of the 24th ; so that Brown's death preceded his by 
some thirty hours. 

CONFEDERATES OCCUPY GRAFTON. 

Sunday morning. May 26th, the troops at Fetterman 
moved up to Grafton, concurrently with the arrival of the 
troops coming from the South ; and they took possession 
of the town, driving people out of their houses in some 
cases to make billet for themselves. The Southern soldiers 
were from Augusta, Fauquier, Pocahontas, Highland and 
Barbour Counties. 

UNION TROOPS GO FORWARD. 

On the morning of May 27th, part of a regiment which 
had been organizing at Camp Carlile, on Wheeling 
Island, under command of Col. B. F. Kelley, took cars 
at the Baltimore & Ohio station for Grafton ; and at noon 
the Sixteenth Ohio crossed the river at Ben wood, and dur- 
ing the afternoon proceeded eastward for the same desti- 
nation. About the same time, Ohio and Indiana troops 
left Parkersburg for Grafton ; but on both lines of road 
the troops were stopped and delayed by the burning of the 
railroad bridges by resident Secessionists. Thursday, 
30th, the advance of Kelley's force reached Grafton to 
the great joy of the inhabitants. The Confederate occu- 



m'clellan crosses the "frontier." 2S9 

pation had lasted only two days, but it was enough to give 
the town a keen appreciation of Southern rule, which they 
were destined never to enjoy again. 

confederates do not wait. 

The Confederates stood not on the order of their go- 
ing when they got warning of the advance of Union troops 
from two directions. The burning of the railroad bridges 
by their friends had given them ample time to secure their 
retreat. ISTevertheless, they seem to have been in some' 
haste to depart. The register of the railroad hotel bore 
the names of a number of prominent Western Virginian 
Secessionists, opposite some of which the landlord had 
penciled ''Not paid," among them "W. P. Thompson, Pro- 
visional Army."' Thompson died in New York a year or 
so ago reputed worth twenty million dollars. One cannot 
but wonder whether he ever settled that hotel bill. 

general m'clellan proclaims. 

On the morning of the 27th appeared in the public 
prints two proclamations from General McClellan, in 
command of the military department, issued from Cincin- 
nati, one addressed to "the Union men of Western Vir- 
ginia ;" the other to the troops under his command, order- 
ing them to "Cross the frontier and enter the soil of Vir- 
ginia." In view of developments in 1862, when it ap- 
peared that instead of being a great general McClellan 
was only a Democratic politician, paralyzing the largest 
army the Un^'ted States had in the field while its com- 
mander instructed President Lincoln how to manage the 

Va— 19 



290 THE KENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

political administration of the war, — seeking to promote 
his chance of being elected President by the "peace-at-any- 
price" party in the iSTorth — one cannot but note the pe- 
culiar phrasing of this proclamation. There were no 
"frontiers" in the United States except where our terri- 
tory bordered Canada and Mexico. The boundaries be- 
tween States were no more frontiers than those between 
counties and townships. Had General McClellan already 
accepted the theory that the Southern Confederacy was a 
foreign power and Virginia a part of it ? The soil of Vir- 
ginia was simply the soil of a subordinate division of the 
United States. The Young Napoleon, like many others, 
had not at that time perhaps realized this truth. 

The concentration of Union troops at Grafton, the 
rout of Porterfield at Phillippa, the summer campaign un- 
der Rosencranz which followed — the killing of Garnett 
and the expulsion of his army from the j^orthwest — are 
part of the military history of the time. 

COMEDY AT FAIRMONT. 

The scenes attending the advance of the troops under 
Kelley over the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, as described 
in the local prints of the time, make entertaining reading. 
At Fairmont, especially, which was the home of several 
active and influential Secessionists, who had been threat- 
ening their Union neighbors, the consternation was ludi- 
crous. Dr. Zadok Kidwell, the politician ; James Neesou, 
lawyer; Jonathan Haymond, merchant; Alpheus F. Haj- 
mond, lawyer and member of the Richmond Convention; 
Drinkard, editor of the secession paper (the Virginian), 



COMEDY OF WAR. 291 

and McDonald, his jolly old Irish assistant, — all ran 
away in most undignified haste, confessing thereby their 
consciousness of guilt and casting their fortunes with the 
Confederacy. Neeson was captured by Burdett's friends 
at Pruntytown, but released by a troop of rebel cavalry 
fleeing from Grafton ; before whom, in turn, Burdett had 
to run away from Pruntytown and make his way to Graf- 
ton for haven. Alpli Haymond's part in the exodus may 
have been due to his anxiety to get back to Richmond to 
look after Western interests in the matter of ad valorem 
taxation ! After the war he came back, a returning prodigal 
who had been consorting with the swine of the Confed- 
eracy, and throwing himself upon the magnanimity of the 
West "Virginia Legislature was allowed to resume his old 
place at the bar ; and although he had declared in some of 
his penitent letters to members of the Legislature that he 
would never seek public position again, he became under 
the ex-Confederate regime, which came in ten years later, 
a judge of the State Supreme Court. 

Concerning the hegira at Fairmont, the Intelligencer, 
summarizing the reports of its correspondents, said edi- 
torially : 

Poor Kidwell almost went off in the costume of the Georgia 
major, viz: "a pair of specs and a pair of spurs." He even left 
his trunk in the street after he had got in his buggy. And the 
way he got through his stable into the alley! It was too bad. 
We cannot tell all a correspondent has told us. 

As for Neeson, he left in the guise of a doctor; took a pair 
of saddle-bags with him and when stopped at one of the out- 
posts got through by his urgent professional representations. 
Somebody was at the point of death and Neeson was their 
family physician riding post-haste to their relief. When last 



'292 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

heard from he had been arrested at Pruntytown by the Union 
men but was likely to get away again through the appearance 
of some secession forces. 

Alph Raymond left neither in a buggy nor went off on horse 
back. He took a few clean shirts, stuffed them in a carpet bag 
and struck out across a cornfield at a fast gait. 

A COLLISION AT CLARKSBURG. 

f 

An incident at Clarksburg, as illustrative of conditions 
just before this movement of troops, may be put down 
here. It is related that at that place on the 20th of May 
some sixty or seventy recruits for the Confederate army 
to rendezvous at Grafton, marched into town from Ro- 
mine's and other neighborhoods. They were armed with 
squirrel rifles. They united and marched through the 
streets, making a rather formidable appearance to unac- 
customed eyes. They were under command of Uriel M. 
Turner, a brother-in-law of Col. Ben. Wilson; ^STorval 
Lewis, brother of Hon. Charles S. Lewis ; Hugh H. Lee,. 
son of Judge George H. Lee, and William P. Cooper, 
editor of Cooper's Clarlshurg Register. The Union men 
of the town were not dismayed. They rang the tocsin with 
the court-house bell, and in a few minutes tht two Union 
companies under Capt. A. C. Moore and Capt. John C. 
Vance formed in line, Avith what guns they could lay 
hands on, ready for action. The display they made fright- 
ened the rebel recruits, who withdrew and sent word that 
if not attacked they would surrender their arms. The 
proposal was accepted, the arms surrendered, Union sen- 
tries posted to guard the town, and the unarmed recruits 
left for a more salubrious climate, which it is presumed 
they found at Grafton, Phillippa and farther South. This 
is the story as told by a correspondent at the time. 



A LOCAL TRAGEDY. 293 

THE RIGHTER TRAGEDY. 

In the same connection may be related a tragic inci- 
dent which occurred on the border of Marion and Harri- 
son a month later, which has not found a place in the mili- 
tary records of the times. Peter B. Righter, a wealthy 
farmer and grazier, lived in a handsome residence on 
Koon's Run, some two miles from the West Fork of the 
Monongahela and four miles northeast from Shinnston. 
He was a hot Secessionist and made his place a rendezvous 
for the Secessionists in the surrounding country, among 
■whom his son was organizing a company for the Confed- 
erate service. Some of the Union neighbors became 
alarmed at the numbers and demonstrations of these 
nightly gatherings, especially after the owner of an adjoin- 
ing farm, Henry R. McCord, who afterwards became lieu- 
tenant in the Twelfth Union Regiment, had been shot at 
by some of them. Complaint was made to the Union 
commandant at Clarksburg. What happened there is de- 
scribed in a letter written from Shinnston June 22, 1861, 
to one of the Harrison County members in the June Con- 
vention then sitting at Wheeling : 

Yesterday, a detachment under Captain Cable, of Company 
I, Twentieth Ohio, arrived here from Mannington via Hessville 
and Lumberport, at which places they toolv several prisoners. 
Shortly after nightfall, Cable detached a squad to go down to 
Righter's under guidance of two of our citizens. On arriving 
at Righter's hdlise, Cable left his men in the yard and advanced 
to the door but could not get admittance. In a few moments a 
signal was heard at the back of the house and instantly seventy 
or eighty rebels who had been collected and concealed by Righter 
rushed around the corner of the house and fired on Cable and 



294 THE KENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

his men, wounding one in the breast, another in the arm, and 
wounding John Nay (one of the guides) very badly in the groin. 
On this attack the troops fired and dispersed, leaving Nay and 
the man wounded in the breast lying on the ground. They were 
afterwards carried to the house of Nay's father about a half 
mile from Righter's. The man wounded in the arm is at your 
house; the one wounded in the breast has since died. The ball 
has been extracted from Nay's wound and it is thought he will 
recover. 

Before daylight this morning, Cable despatched messengers 
to Clarksburg and went himself to Fairmont. He returned 
about noon to-day with about 250 men and went on to Righter's, 
great numbers of our citizens accompanying. They found the 
premises deserted. The troops entered the house and appro- 
priated everything that they thought would be useful. Then 
they set fire to the house (which you know is one of the finest 
in this section of country), to the stables, barns and all the out- 
buildings, and they were consumed in one general conflagration. 
I was present and witnessed it. Then they took all the horses 
on the farm and several wagons and buggies, loaded the wounded 
men into them and moved to Mannington. * * * One incident 
occurred at Righter's at the sacking of their premises which I 
must not omit. Our troops had prisoner one Banks Corbin. 
While they were guarding him, he being on horseback started 
off as if to escape. They commanded him to halt twice, but he 
paid no attention. They again told him to stop or they would 
shoot him from his horse. Instead of complying he put spurs 
to his horse and attempted to escape. The Captain ordered 
his men to fire. About a hundred obeyed, at least fifty balls 
striking him in the back and nearly cutting him in two. He 
fell from his horse lifeless, not knowing what hurt him. 

Captain Cable subsequently published a statement of 
this affair. As explaining his reasons for destroying the 
house he says it showed "undoubted evidence of having 
been recently arranged for military purposes." Four of 
his men had been severely wounded, and he claims four 



DRAWING THE LINES CLEARING THE FIELD. 295 

rebels were killed — three certain — and four to six 
wounded. The only property taken, he says, was beds, 
blankets and teams with which to remove the wounded. 

AN EDITOR RETIRES. 

On the 27th of May, the Wheeling Union, edited by 
PhiliiD Henry Moore, who had kept standing at the head 
of his editorial columns this declaration of principles: 
"We owe obedience to the Federal government only be- 
cause Virginia has commanded us to obey its laws ; there- 
fore whenever Virginia shall release us from this obliga- 
tion, we will acknowledge the binding authority of that 
government no longer," ceased publication and the editor 
left for the South by river steamer. The time was oppor- 
tune, in view of the mobilizing of the troops on Wheeling 
Island. The Unionists were far more tolerant than the 
Secessionists. If a Union paper with as strong a declara- 
tion on that side had attempted to maintain itself at Rich- 
mond, the editor would long before have been in prison 
if not murdered by a mob. But the time for tolerance of 
open rebellion was about at an end in the Northwest. The 
temperature of belligerence was rapidly rising, until the 
collision at Phillippa instantly fused all divergent thought 
and purpose on each side in the welding heat of war. Then 
came the instant recognition of the fact that the issue was 
joined ; and the time for temporizing, or for toleration of 
differences on the deadly issue, was past. 

The timely movement of troops to Grafton, the routing 
and driving out of the rebel forces gathered at Phillippa, 
the later defeat of Pegram at Rich Mountain, the pursuit 



296 THE KEXDINCr OF VIRGINIA. 

of Garnett's retreating army and the death of its com- 
mander at Cheat Kiver, cleared the field for the Union 
men of the Northwest, and gave cohesion and vitality to 
their plans. From this time forward, the work of restor- 
ing civil government proceeded without apprehension and 
without a hitch. Never was the argument of force more 
opportunely applied, never with liappier effect. 



CHAPTER X. 

THE JUNB CONVENTION— REORGANIZING THE STATE 
GOVERNMENT. 

MEN WHO LEFT THEIR IMPRESS. 

At two o'clock, afternoon of the lltli day of June, 
1861, the men who were to wield a potent hand in shaping 
the destinies of the western part of the Old Dominion, 
whose work therein and in its wider influence was to ex- 
tend far down the reaches of time, came together in the 
old Washington Hall, where their constituents and prede- 
cessors had on the 13th of Mav raised the banner of re- 
sistance to the insurrection and usurpation at Richmond. 

Francis H. Peirpoint, destined to head the rehabili- 
tated Commonwealth, and to seat its authority four years 
lated in the reconquered capital on the James, called the 
Convention to order and moved that Dr. Dennis B. Dor- 
sey, of Morgantown, be called to the chair. 

Gibson L. Cranmer, who had been one of the secre- 
taries of the May Convention, a man of scholarly and 
professional attainments, was made temporary secretary. 

Rev. Gordon Battelle, an eminent minister of the 
Methodist Church, then presiding elder of the Wheeling 
district, opened the session with prayer. 

297 



298 



THE RENDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 




Arthur I. Boreman. 



Arthur I. Boreman moved for a committee on creden- 
tials. This committee as appointed later consisted of 
Arthur I. Boreman, John J. Brown, of Preston; Col. 
James Evans, of Monongalia; Lewis Wetzel, of Mason, 
and Daniel Lamb, of Ohio. 

A Committee on Rules was moved by Hon. John S. 
Carlile;- of Harrison, and constituted as follows : John S. 
Carlile, George McC. Porter, of Hancock; Daniel Pols- 
lej, of Mason ; Harrison Hagans, of Preston ; Andrew 
Flesher, of Jackson. 

George McC. Porter, who had distinguished himself 
in the Richmond Convention as a loyalist of unflinching 



THE JUNE CONVENTION. 299 

courage, was a young lawyer of talents and personal graces, 
fated to an early death. It was he who first suggested 
to the writer to preserve documentary and other material 
and write the history of the events then transpiring around 
us. ^'Why not do this yourself?" I asked Mr. Porter. 
There was a prescient sadness in his reply: "I shall not 
be here." His death occurred in 1866. 

A committee on permanent organization moved by 
Francis H. Peirpoint was composed of Mr. Peirpoint, W. 
H. Copley, of Wayne ; Elbert H. Caldwell, of Marshall ; 
John S. Burdett, of Taylor, and Chapman J. Stuart, of 
Doddridge. 



At the opening of the second day's session, the Com- 
mittee on Credentials reported the following list of gen- 
tlemen entitled to seats — some chosen delegates June 4th, 
others ex-officio as members of the General Assembly: 

Barbour — John H. Shuttlesworth and Spencer Dayton, delegates. 

Brooke — John D. Nichols and Campbell Tarr, delegates; Joseph 
Gist, Senator; H. W. Crothers, House of Delegates. 

Cabell — Albert Laidley, H. of D. (declined to take oath and re- 
turned home; name stricken from roll June 19th.) 

Monongalia — Leroy Kramer and Joseph Snyder, H. of D.; Ralph 
L. Berkshire, William Price, James Evans and D. B. Dorsey, 
delegates. 

Ohio — Thomas H. Logan and Andrew Wilson, H. of D.; Daniel 
Lamb, James W. Paxton, George Harrison and Chester D. 
Hubbard, delegates. 

Pleasants and Ritchie — James W. Williamson, H. of D.; C. W. 
Smith and William H. Douglas, delegates. 

Preston — Charles Hooton and William B. Zinn, H. of D.; Wil- 
liam B. Crane, John Howard, Harrison Hagans and John J. 
Brown, delegates. 



300 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

Randolph and Tucker — Solomon Parsons, delegate. 

Roane — T. A. Roberts, delegate. 

Taylor — Lemuel E. Davidson, H. of D.; John S. Burdett and 

Samuel B. Todd, delegates. 
Upshur — Daniel D. T. Farnsworth, H. of D. ; John L. Smith, 

delegate. 
Wayne— William Radcliffe, H. of D.; W. W. Brumfield and W. H. 

Copley, delegates. 
Wetzel — James G. West, H. of D.; Reuben Martin and James P. 

Ferrell, delegates. 
Wirt — James A. Williamson, H. of D.; Henry Newman and B. T. 

Graham, delegates. (Williamson did not appear, and June 

19th his name was stricken from the roll.) 
Wood — John W. Moss, H. of D.; Arthur I. Boreman and Peter 

G. Van Winkle, delegates. 
Alexandria — Henry S. Martin and James T. Close, delegates. 
Fairfax — John Hawxhurst and Eben E. Mason, delegates. 
Hampshire — James Carskadon, S.; Owen D. Downey, George W. 

Broski, James H. Trout and James I. Barrick, delegates. 
Hardy — John Michael, delegate. 

Doddridge and Tyler — Chapman J. Stuart, S.; William I. Bore- 
man, H. of D.; Daniel D. Johnson and James A. Foley, dele- 
gates. 
Harrison — John J. Davis and John C. Vance, H. of D. ; John S. 

Carlile, Solomon S. Fleming, Lot Bowen and Benjamin F. 

Shuttlesworth, delegates. 
Jackson — Daniel Frost, H. of D.; James F. Scott and Andrew 

Flesher, delegates. 
Lewis — Presly M. Hale and J. A. J. Lightburn, delegates. 
Marion — Richard Fast and Fontaine Smith, H. of D.; Francis H. 

Peirpoint. John S. Barnes, Andrew F. Ritchie and James O. 

Watson, delegates. 
Marshall — Remembrance Swan, H. of D.; Elbert H. Caldwell and 

Robert Morris, delegates. 
Mason — Lewis Wetzel, H. of D.; Charles B. Waggener and Daniel 

Polsley, delegates. 

Additional members were admitted during June and 
Auo'ust sessions as follows : 



THE JUNE CONVENTION. 301 

Tucker — Samuel Crane, delegate. 

Barbour — Nathan H. Taft and David M. Meyers, delegates. 

Upshur — John Love, delegate. 

Webster, Braxton and Nicholas — Henry C. Moore, delegate. 

Kanawha — Lewis Ruffner and Greenbury Slack, delegates. 

Putnam — George C. Boyer, H. of D.; Dudley S. Montague and 
John Hall, delegates. 

Marshall — James Burley, S. 

Monongalia — Thomas Gather, S. 

Jefferson — George Koonce, delegate. 

Lewis — Blackwell Jackson, delegate. 

Jackson — James A. Smith, delegate. 

Harrison — Charles S. Lewis, delegate (in place of Lot Bowen, re- 
signed). 

Marion — Ephraim B. Hall, delegate (in place of F. H. Peirpoint, 
appointed Governor). 



The permanent organization of the Convention was 
effected by malting: 

Arthur I. Boreman, President. 
Gibson L. Cranmer, Secretary. 
Thomas Hornbrook, Sergeant-at-Arms. 

A MODERN CARNOT. 

Thomas Hornbrook, in connection with public affairs, 
was a sort of man-of-all-work. He did everything that was 
left undone by others, and led in doing the many things 
which nobody else had the forethought to see needed to be 
done. He looked after the preparations always necessary when 
meetings were to be held, announcements to be made, 
quarters, hall and committee-rooms to be provided ; he or- 
ganized, like another Carnot, the munitions indispensable 
to every kind of enterprise which could forward the Union 



302 



THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 




Thomas Hornbrook. 



cause. He was Surveyor of Customs, and for the emer- 
gency was armed with arbitrary powers and charged with 
the duty of preventing the shipment of any goods to the 
interior which might be intended for rebel supplies. He 
had more than enough business of his own to fill all his 
waking hours ;_ but somehow he could always lend a hand 
to push along the car of progress in any good cause to 
which he gave himself. He had been an early and ardent 
Republican and it was a labor of love with him to help 
along everything calculated to promote the cause of the 
Union, the new State and free State. 



THE JUNE CONVENTION. 303 

One fruit of Mr. Ilornbrook's selection as sergeant-at- 
arms was tliat when the Convention adjourned at the close 
of the second day it was to meet next morning in the 
United States court room in the Custom House ; and here 
all their succeeding sessions were held. 

KEGAKDLESS OF RICHMOND. 

After permanent officers had been chosen, the next 
thing w^as to prescribe for them and for the members an 
oath, in which they promised to "support the Constitution 
of the United States and the laws made in pursuance 
thereof as the supreme law of the land, anything in the 
ordinances of the Convention which assembled in Rich- 
mond on the 13th day of -February last to the contrary 
notwithstanding." This oath was administered to the 
President by Andrew Wilson, a justice of the peace for 
Ohio County ; and by the President, in turn, to the mem- 
bers. 

PRESIDENT BOREMAN PITCHES THE KEY. 

President Boreman, in taking the chair, after reciting 
briefly what had been done by way of secession in Vir- 
ginia and elsewhere, said: 

Here in Western Virginia we have determined that, by the 
help of Him who rules on high, we will resist the action of the 
Rictimond Convention, which has practiced upon us a monstrous 
usurpation of power, violated the Constitution of the country 
and every rule of right. We have determined, I say, to resist it; 
and under this determination we are found here to-day to take 
definite action such as will result in Western Virginia, if not the 
whole of Virginia, remaining in the Union of our fathers. 



304 THE KENDITs^G OF VIRGINIA. 

THANKS FOR THE RESCUE. 

The next thing was a series of resolutions, offered by 
Mr, Carlile, thanking the United States authorities for 
their prompt response to the call for protection ; thanking 
General McClellan for rescuing the people of Western 
Virginia from the destruction and spoliation inaugurated 
by the rebel forces ; hailing Colonel Kelley and "our own 
gallant First Regiment" as "deliverers from the ruin and 
slavery provided by the conspirators who have temporary 
possession of our State;" repudiati-ng the "secession her- 
esy" that the march of Federal troops into Virginia for 
the protection of Virginia citizens of the United States 
is an "invasion." 

A Committee on Business, to whom should be referred 
all resolutions in reference to State and Federal relations, 
was appointed on Mr. Carlile's motion and composed as 
follows : John S. Carlile, Daniel Lamb, F. H. Peirpoint, 
Harrison Hagans, Peter G. Van Winkle, Ralph L. Berk- 
shire, Daniel Polsley, William I. Boreman, Elbert H. 
Caldwell, Daniel Frost, George McC. Porter, Daniel D. 
T. Farnsworth and William H. Copley. Afterwards, on 
motion of Mr. Burdett the following were added : James 
T. Close, James Carskadon, John Hawxhurst and Samuel 
Crane. 

CARLILE STILL THE LEADER. 

This committee on whom the serious work of the Con- 
vention was to fall embraced a half dozen of the ablest 
men in the body, and as able as will be found anywhere in 



THE JUNE CONVENTION. 305 

a similar body. Mr. Carlile, bj moving for the commit- 
tee, had, with his accustomed adroitness, taken the lead 
of the Convention, as it entitled him to the chairmanship. 
There was at this time no lack of robustness in Mr. Car- 
lile's loyalty to the United States. His talents as an orator 
and tactician, his aggressive and self-reliant temper, the 
clean-cut vigor of his attitude towards the rebellion, the 
intrepidity of his course at Richmond, had given him a 
commanding position of leadership. If there were heart- 
burnings because of his large share in the popular ap- 
plause, it did not show itself here. 

FIRST MOVE FOE DIVISION. 

Before the close of this day's session, Dr. Dorsey of- 
fered for reference to the Business Committee the follow- 
ing: 

Resolved, That it shall be in part the business of this Con- 
vention to make the requisite preparatory arrangements for 
separation from Virginia and the formation into a new State of 
such counties as are represented in this body by delegates or 
otherwise and are desirous of entering into the new State organ- 
ization. 

Resolved, That said preliminary arrangements when made 
by the Convention shall, in compliance with the Constitution of 
the United States, be submitted for approval to the Legislature 
now convened in this city as being the only loyal and legitimate 
Legislature of the State of Virginia; and afterwards, if ap- 
proved by it, shall be submitted to the Congress of the United 
States. 

Resolved, That this mode of meeting the present exigencies 
of Western Virginia is preferable to that of reconstructing the 
government of Virginia, inasmuch as it is equally legal and does 
not impose upon us the calamity of an overburdened State debt, 
Va.— 20 



306 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

no part of which we owe in equity, or the scarcely less dis- 
astrous calamity of repudiating that debt and thus ruining the 
financial credit of the State. 

A FALSE NOTE. 

Dr. Dorsey erred, it seems to the writer, in supposing 
that Western Virginia might by any particular mode of 
procedure run away from its just responsibility for a por- 
tion of the Virginia debt, and that it owed no part of this 
debt in equity. He forgot to recognize the third party in 
interest, the creditors, and their equity. There were two 
distinct equities to be considered : that between the two 
sections of the State ; that between them both and the cred- 
itors. Capitalists had loaned their money to the Common- 
wealth on the tax-paying capacity and property liability 
of the entire territory. They were not to blame for the 
unequal and unjust disposition made of their money by 
the borrower as between the eastern and western sections. 
However unfairly it may have been distributed by the 
State, that was no concern of the creditors, and it could 
not impair their rights nor diminish their security. 

DECLARATION OF GRIEVANCES. 

Early in the sitting of June 13th, Mr. Carlile, from 
the Business Committee, reported a "Declaration of the 
People of Virginia," a document which took a prominent 
place in the proceedings and records as laying the ground- 
work on which to erect the structure of reorganization. 
The paper had been drawn by Mr. Carlile himself, who 
was not so close and precise a draftsman as some other 
members of the committee, who could have prepared a 



THE JUNE CONVENTION. 307 

paper more exactly expressive of what the Convention 
wanted to say. As first reported, the first paragraph of 
the declaration contained this statement : "And the exist- 
ing constitution does not confer upon the General As- 
sembly the power to call a convention to alter its pro- 
visions, or to change the relations of the Commonwealth, 
without the previously expressed consent of such majority" 
(meaning a popular majority). The fact was that the 
constitution of 1851 did permit the General Assembly to 
do just that thing — looking to the future exercise of the 
power, thpve is reason to believe, for just such sinister pur- 
pose as lay behind the call of the Assembly together by 
Letcher in January, 1861. Mr. Van Winkle detected the 
error, and the declaration was corrected to say that the 
Convention had been called without the previously ex- 
pressed consent of such majority as required by Virginia 
precedents. Granville Parker in his "Formation" makes 
the point that the calling of the Convention was not "there- 
fore a usurpation" as the declaration puts it, though there 
was plenty of usurpation afterwards. A proposition was 
made in the Assembly to submit the question of calling a 
convention to popular vote, but was voted down. The same 
cabal — at least the same purpose — which had omitted the 
requirement from the constitution was not going to risk 
defeat now by making this concession to the people. Mr. 
Parker claims that neither earlier constitutions nor the 
practice theretofore required the question of calling a 
convention to be submitted to popular vote, and that all 
previous conventions had been convened by the Assembly 
without expression of such popular approval. On the 
other hand^ Mr. Willey in his "Sketch" says the action of 



308 



THE REJfDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 




James W. Paxton. 

the Assembly in January, 1861, was 'Svitliout precedent;'* 
that ''no convention had previously assembled in Virginia 
until the question had first received the sanction of the 
people." 

It was ordered that the declaration be printed and 
made the order for the next day. 



paxton sounds a true note. 

In this day's session Mr. Paxton offered the following: 

Resolved, That the people of Northwestern Virginia have 
long and patiently borne the position of political inferiority 
forced upon them by unequal representation in the State Legisla- 
ture and by unjust, oppressive and unequal taxation; but that 



THE JUNE CONVENTION. 309 

the so-called ordinance of secession, passed by the Convention 
which met in Richmond on the 13th of February, last, is the 
crowning act of infamy which has aroused them to a determina- 
tion to resist all injustice and oppression and to assert and for- 
ever maintain their rights and liberties in the Union and under 
the Constitution of the United States. 

The resolution having been read, Mr. Paxton said: 

In considering matters that come before us, it is very diffi- 
cult but very important that we all realize the actual existence of 
war. We must not forget that we are now engaged in a struggle 
for the Nation's very existence; that our differences are not now 
being settled, as heretofore, at the ballot-box, peacefully and 
quietly, but by the bayonet and at the cannon's mouth. You, sir, 
and I, and every American citizen, this day are parties to this 
struggle on one side or the other, as loyalists or rebels; and he 
who sympathizes with, who, directly or indirectly, r.ids or en- 
courages either side, is just as much a party to this war as if 
on the tented field. I assert, and in doing so appeal to all past 
observation and experience for my justification, that there is not 
nor can there be any real neutrality; that assumed neutrality, 
either by a State or by an individual, is practical secession. 
* * * We are fully committed to the war of patriotism 
against treason; and I am very sure from the indications here 
that there will be neither faltering nor hesitation now. The 
time has come for action — for active resistance to the despotism 
that will overwhelm us as surely as we remain tacit and inactive. 
We are now called upon to perform our part — and it is no unim- 
portant one — towards the preservation and perpetuity of this 
great government. We must and will be sustained in the effort 
by the whole force and power of the Federal government. And, 
sir, we shall succeed in driving treason and rebellion beyond 
our borders. That is our mission. Let us do that work. 

Let it be noted here that James W. Paxton, of Wheel- 
ing, was one of the most attractive figures in the Conven- 
tion ; would have been so in any body of which he might 
have been a member. A man of remarkably fine physique 



310 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

— six feet four in stature and nobly proportioned ; a hand- 
some, striking face, expressing great intelligence ; dark 
v/aving hair, worn rather long according to the fashion of 
that day ; a man of wealth, always handsomely dressed and 
perfectly groomed ; of simple democratic manners ; an 
ardent hater of slavery, though himself a slaveholder — 
and perhaps the only one in Virginia who had voted for 
Lincoln ; possessed of wide information and strong good 
sense ; not given to talk, but capable on occasion of ex- 
pressing pregnant thoughts in fitting words, — if Mr. Pax- 
ton had had less money he might have had more ambition ; 
and driven by this and the spur of poverty, he might have 
made a distinguished figure in political life. 

Mr. Carlile, from the Business Committee, offered a 
resolution which was adopted, inviting the loyal people in 
counties not yet represented to send delegates to the Con- 
vention. 

Mr. Frost submitted one for reference, requesting all 
persons within the limits of Virginia engaged in rebellious 
movements against the United States to ''desist and return 
to their allegiance," and requiring all ''seditious assem- 
blages to disperse, and all companies mustered into the 
service of the Southern Confederacy to be immediately dis- 
banded." This was suggested as basis of an ordinance. 

KEOEGANIZATION ORDINANCE. 

After the opening on the fourth day, Mr. Carlile re- 
ported from the committee an ordinance for the reorganiza- 
tion of the State government, which was made the order 
for the following Wednesday, the 19th. Mr. Carlile an- 
nounced that the Central Committee appointed by the 



THE JUNE CONVENTION. 311 

May Convention had taken steps whereby 2,000 stand of 
good arms had been procured, 500 of which had arrived 
in the city that day and the other 1,500 of which would 
be there that evening or next morning. 

DISSECTING THE DECLAEATION. 

The Declaration coming up as the order of the day, 
Mr. Dorsey thought there was an error or inadvertency 
in one sentence of the first paragraph. It set forth that- 
when any form of government is found inadequate for the 
true purpose of government, it is the right and duty of 
the people to alter or abolish the same; that the Virginia 
bill of rights expressly reserves this right to a majority 
of the people, but that ''under the existing constitution 
the General Assembly has no power to call a convention 
to alter its provisions or change the relations of the Com- 
monwealth without the previously expressed consent of 
such majority." Mr. Dorsey thought this seemed to mean 
that with the previously expressed consent of such major- 
ity, a convention called by the General Assembly had the 
power "to change the relations of the Commonwealth;" 
and if that meant Federal "relations," this was a virtual 
concession of the doctrine of secession. His objection to 
this document, however, related to its connection with 
other documents as being part of a systematic plan which 
had been prepared by the Committee reporting the Declar- 
ation. 

Mr. Carlile said there was no squinting towards the 
heresy of secession in the language quoted. The right 
spoken of is the right of the people to alter or abolish their 



ol2 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

government — the right of revolution. Mr. Dorsey asked 
what "relations" were meant in the clause, and how 
"change the relations of the Commonwealth?" 

]\Ir. Carlile replied that it meant such change as might 
be effected by an amendment to the Constitution of the 
United States. Such an amendment ratified by the con- 
stitutional number of States might affect the present rela- 
tions which Virginia has to the United States and give it 
another and different relation ; and the people of Virginia 
by the ratification of such an amendment would in this 
v/ay have the right to "change their relations." After the 
restoration of peace he hoj)ed one of the first acts of the 
people of the States would be a N'ational Convention, 
which should, if it did nothing else, change our relations 
so far as treason is concerned. He wanted to see a little 
more stringent provision on that subject. He wanted that 
which goes to destroy the perpetuity of our government, 
whether it be an overt act or not, to be punished as treason. 
This was all the declaration meant — to cover the right, 
never denied, of revolution. 

MR. DORSEY^S PLAN. 

Mr. Dorsey expressed himself satisfied with the ex- 
planation. His only remaining objection to the declara- 
tion was as part of a general plan towards which the Con- 
vention was moving : first, to declare that the offices in the 
State were vacant ; then to proceed to make arrangements 
for filling them ; then to go on, step by step, to the other 
arrangements necessary for the reconstruction of the gov- 
ernment of Virginia. The other plan, indicated, rather 



THE JUNE CONVENTION. 313 

than drawn out, in his resolutions submitted Tuesday, was 
to go as far in this other phm as necessary ; to call to- 
gether the Legislature of Virginia and then to submit to 
that Legislature the proposition of separating Western 
from Eastern Virginia and establishing a new State gov- 
ernment. He proceeded to elaborate the argument. He 
held that both plans were identical in principle ; that the 
Federal government would recognize action taken under 
either. It was a revolutionary movement altogether. Both 
plans were revolutionary; and if the general government 
could recognize one, it could the other. He himself was 
for pushing the separation, and not waiting till the eastern 
part of the State had been whipped into submission. His 
objection to the plan of reorganization as far as developed 
by the committee was that it made no specific provision for 
the coming separation ; which he deemed the paramount 
object in the minds of Western Virginians. For his part, 
he would not vote for a single provision that might be 
proposed by the committee unless he could see a distinct 
intention to provide for the separation. 

Mr. Van Winkle said he had long been convinced that 
every interest of Northwestern Virginia demanded sep- 
aration from the East ; and under other circumstances, he 
believed such separation ought to be effected in a friendly 
manner. Whenever the time should come, he was willing 
to do everything he could to effect a separation. But he 
did not favor Dr. Dorsey's plan of putting that before the 
other objects to be accomplished by the Convention. 

Mr. Carlile would remind his friend from Monongalia 
that as yet there was no Legislature to give its consent, as 
required, to the separation. Let us first, he said, repudiate 



314 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

Letcher and his transfer to the Southern Confederacy ; let 
us assemble a Legislature here of our o^^^l that will be rec- 
ognized by the United States government as the Legisla- 
ture of Virginia ; and with the assent of such a Legislature 
to our separation, the way is clear. "Tw'O great objects," 
he said, "influence and govern my actions. The first, I 
am free to say — the dearest and nearest my heart — is the 
perpetuity of the Union." When that had been assured, 
they could consider the interests of their own immediate 
section of the State. 

John D. l^ichols, of Brooke, favored the plan of the 
committee. The people of Brooke, he said, feel in the 
matter of a division of the State like Dr. Dorsey: that 
they have no identity of interest with the eastern part of 
the State, and have long sought to effect the purpose indi- 
cated by that genileman ; but there were steps that could 
not be taken at this preliminary stage of the proceedings. 
They owed constitutional obligations to the Federal gov- 
ernment and needed its countenance and protection. The 
plan proposed by the committee was the only one that 
could be adopted at this stage of the proceedings to insure 
recognition and continued favor with the general govern- 
ment. 

Dr. Dorsey wished to explain that he had not favored 
(as some seemed to have understood) a violent and in- 
formal separation of the State without the intervention of 
any preliminaries whatever. He proposed to go on with 
his plan so far as it was necessary to the assembling of the 
Legislature ; then to propose to that Legislature the matter 



THE JUNE CONVENTION. 315 

of dividing the State; then to submit its action to Con- 
gress for ratification, according to the spirit and very let- 
ter of the Constitution of the United States. 

In the next day's session, Mr. Flesher, of Jackson, of- 
fered for reference resolutions declaring null and void 
any levies made by county or corporation courts in aid of 
the rebel army. He said he did this understanding that 
the Jackson County Court had ordered a levy of $3,000 
for the support of rebel soldiers enlisted in that county. 

HOW THE RICHMOND CONVENTION WAS CAPTURED. 

On the seventh day, pending the consideration of the 
Declaration as the order of the day, Mr. Peirpoint ad- 
dressed the Convention at considerable length. In the 
course of his remarks he said : 

When the Virginia Convention assembled at Richmond it 
was ascertained that three-fourths of it were opposed to disunion. 
But the plot began to converge to a point. Major Anderson was 
in Port Sumter and it was well known that his provisions were 
nearly run out. It was known the very day they would run out, 
and that he must be reinforced either in provisions or in pro- 
visions and men both. The Virginia Secessionists then called 
their mob convention to meet in Richmond on the 16th of 
April. A messenger was sent from Richmond to Charleston 
the day before Port Sumter was fired upon. He made his speech 
there saying there was one thing that must be done, and Virginia 
would secede. They knew in Charleston what that thing was; 
and Governor Pickens ordered Port Sumter to be attacked. The 
attack was made, and a dispatch came to the Governor of Vir- 
ginia from the Governor of South Carolina saying: "Port 
Sumter is fired upon; what will Virginia do now?" It is said 
the Convention would not even then have dissolved their con- 
nection with the United States but the Secessionists, without 



310 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

the authority of the Governor, dispatched troops to seize Har- 
per's Ferry and Gosport Navy Yard with all their munitions of 
war. The declarations had gone forth from Charleston through- 
out the South that they intended to seize the Capital immedi- 
ately; that Lincoln and his cabinet were trembling in their 
seats and were consulting whether to remove to Philadelphia 
or New York. Thus they forced the President to issue his 
proclamation for 75,000 troops. They knew he would be bound 
to issue the proclamation or retire in disgrace; that Virginia 
must be called on for her quota of troops or secession be 
acknowledged. The proclamation came. Virginia was called on; 
and then the proclamation was styled by the conspirators the 
crowning act of infamy of the Administration, on account of 
which they must secede. Thus the plot was laid and consum- 
mated. The plot had been conceived in perjury at Washington 
and carried out by falsehood throughout the country, attended 
by coercion, insult, and a reign of terror which was equally con- 
certed throughout Virginia as well as in the other Southern 
States. 

This was in June. If Mr. Peirpoint had then known 
what was to be disclosed by Letcher six months later re- 
garding- his treasonable preparations for war long before 
the Eichmond Convention met, he might not have said, as 
he did, that the seizure of Harper's Ferry and Gosport 
Avas "without authority of the Governor." It is true the 
Metropolitan Hall junta seems to have taken the reins, 
but certainly with Letcher's full consent ; for it is a matter 
of official record that the muskets captured at Harper's 
Ferry were distributed under Letcher's orders, part of 
them to the rebel militia in Baltimore. 

THE GROUNDS FOR RESTORATION. 

Towards the close of his remarks, Mr. Peirpoint thus 
defined the attitude of this Convention: 



THE JUNE CONVENTION. 317 

The Constitution of the United States guarantees to every 
State (and I take it only to the loyal people of that State) 
the right to a republican form of government. The Virginia 
declaration of rights says the people have a right to peaceably 
assemble and alter or amend their form of government when it 
may become necessary. This exigency is upon us. The govern- 
ment of the State is in rebellion against the United States — 
against the laws and loyal people of Virginia. We, represent- 
ing these people here, are bound to take immediate action to 
protect their lives and property. We assemble lawfully, being 
sent hither by the loyal people of Virginia, according to the 
mode prescribed by the convention which met in this city in 
May last, to do whatever is necessary to be done for the safety 
and protection of the loyal people of Virginia. And, sir, I would 
not be afraid to-day to place my position and that of this Con- 
vention for legality, and to stake my life upon it, before the best 
jurists and statesmen in the civilized world who understand 
anything about constitutional liberty and the facts with which 
we are surrounded, and risk their decision. * * * j ^m sure 
that the President and Congress must and will recognize us as 
the rightful government of the State. To do otherwise would be 
to say that by the forms of law we are bound to lie until our 
hands and feet are tied, until our property is taken from us and 
ourselves swung upon the gallows. God's law, nature's law, 
man's law never did impose any such obligations as these upon 
any man or people where they were acting with a true and loyal 
heart and upright intention to assert their rights legally. Sir, 
there can be nothing in law, nothing in reason, nothing in prin- 
ciple nor in practice that can be brought against us. Every- 
thing is in our favor and everything must aid and sustain us in 
our efforts. 

THE DECLAKATION FINDS FITTING PARALLEL. 

The declaration was then passed to its engrossment ; 
and in the afternoon, the document having been engrossed 
on parchment, it was put to vote and adopted by the unani- 
mous vote of all present, fifty-six in number. Mr. Carlilc 



318 THE EEPTDING OF VIRGINIA. • 

remarked that it was a happj^ coincidence and one that 
he hailed as an auspicious omen "that we have fifty-six 
votes recorded in favor of our declaration, and we may 
remember there were jnst fifty-six signers to the Declara- 
tion of Independence." The remark produced great ap- 
plause and feeling throughout the hall. Another coinci- 
dence remarked by a member was that the date was the 
{inniversary of the battle of Bunker Hill. Another that 
might have been mentioned as even more fitting, was that 
it was the anniversary of the day when in the States Gen- 
eral of France, summoned by Louis XVIth, after long 
waiting for the other two orders to join them, the Tiers 
Etat, or "Commons," of France declared themselves the 
National Assembly and thus began the great Revolution. 




TO ARREST PUBLIC ENEMIES, 

The following day provision was made for procuring 
State seals, the design to be the same as the existing Vir- 
ginia seal with the addition of the words : "Liberty and 
Union." The Committee on Business reported an ordi- 
nance "to authorize the apprehending of suspicious per- 
sons in time of war." The ordinance proposed to so amend 
the code of Viro-inia that the Governor niio-ht cause to be 



THE JUNE COXVEXTION. 319 

apprehended and secured, and compelled to leave the State, 
"all suspicious subjects or citizens of any foreign state 
or power at war with the United States," and then pro- 
ceeded to set forth what had been done at Richmond, the 
eifect of which had been — so far as force could make it 
effective — to place Virginia in subjection to the Confed- 
erate States of America. This ordinance was for the 
benefit of those who recognized the legality of such transfer 
of allegiance. It also provided for the punishment of 
sheriffs and others paying public money to the pretended 
authority of the Confederate States or the illegal State 
government at Richmond, now waging war against the 
United States. The Committee also followed with an 
ordinance fixing salaries of State and other officers. 

FARNSAVORTII BRINGS UP DIVISION. 

Mr. Farnsworth, of Upshur, offered this resolution: 

Resolved. That one of the great objects of this Convention in 
reorganizing the State government is that we may place the 
same in position of loj'alty to the United States, in order that 
we may soon be able by constitutional legislation to separate our- 
selves from our oppressors in Eastern Virginia and be admitted 
a new and separate State in the glorious Union of States. 

Resolved. That the President of this Convention communi- 
cate the foregoing resolution to the President of the United 
States and his cabinet. 

A lengthy discussion followed the offer of these reso- 
lutions. Mr. Farnsworth explained that his object was to 
show to the people by an authorized expression of the Con- 
vention that it intended to take such steps as would create 
a new State, and to show the object of the steps the Con- 
vention was now taking. 



320 THE EEXDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

Mr. Caldwell, of Marshall, thought it was at once a 
courtesy and due to the Federal government that some- 
thing like what was indicated in the resolution should be 
communicated to the President and his Cabinet as an ex- 
pression of the views and intentions of this Convention. 

DOESEY CHANGES HIS MIND. 

Dr. Dorsej said it was well known that he had been 
advocating this new State movement as earnestly as he 
knew how; but after mature consideration of the subject, 
and after having had several resolutions like this sub- 
mitted to him in private, he had come to the conclusion 
that it would be exceedingly inapposite for this Convention 
to pass such a resolution at this stage of its proceedings, 
since by doing so we would be anticipating the future ac- 
tion of the Legislature of Virginia as well as of this Con- 
vention. This was not the proper time, he had become 
convinced, to make a proposition for a division of the 
State. When the State government had been fully reor- 
ganized, then such propositions might be submitted. This 
announcement. Dr. Dorsey said, might seem incongruous 
with his former position ; but the plans he had proposed 
looked to just such an arrangement. 

Mr. Carlile suggested that as the proposition to divide 
the State might excite the hostility of the great capitalists 
in New York, who held the bulk of the Virginia debt, and 
their influence might be used at Washington against the 
recognition of the reorganized State, it would be wise to 
wait until we had been recognized as part and parcel of 
the United States and as laAvful authorities of Virginia 



THE JUNE CONVENTION. 321 

before making the new-State plan conspicuous. "I regret," 
lie said, "that we have to postpone this subject of a separa- 
tion for an hour; but high above ail things is the per- 
petuity of the Union. What would admission as a new 
State into the Union be worth if your Union itself should 
be destroyed V 

Mr. Van Winkle remarked that public expectation in 
the western counties had been turned to this Convention 
as if its only business was to separate Western from East- 
ern Virginia ; '^but we come here and find that it is neces- 
sary for us to take an entirely different course of action." 
He suggested, however, whether it was not "due to the con- 
stituents of many members that there should be some au- 
thorized expression by the Convention on this subject, ex- 
hibiting the reasons of necessity that induce us to abandon 
a course which it was supposed we were about to adopt ?" 

Mr. Burdett said the w^orld knew we were looking 
ulteriorly to a division of the State. Wall street would 
know it despite all efforts to cover it up. The lobby would 
be in Washington just the same, and we would have to 
fight them anyhow. But he did not think any serious 
obstacle would be thrown in our way. 

Mr. Snyder, of Monongalia, obtained leave to read a 
resolution declaring that "the geographical position and 
business and social relations of Western Virginia are such 
that her vital interests demand a division of the State ; that 
the proper time to make such demand will be when Vir- 
ginia has a legally constituted Legislature; that then we 
will use our utmost endeavors to consummate that di- 
vision." 

Va.— 21 



322 THE KENDING OF VIKGINIA. 

Mr. Barnes, of Marion, also by permission, read a reso- 
lution declaring it ''inexpedient at this time to take into 
consideration the subject of a division of the State." 

Mr. Hubbard, of Ohio, said the case before the people 
was no longer one of choice or even of preference. It had 
become one of duty. "We are not here," he said, "to 
create a State but to save one ; not here to create a govern- 
ment but to help save a government." He hoped they 
would say nothing now about the division of the State. 
"If we find in the future that we can do better to separate, 
I shall be as willing as any other man." 

Mr. Farnsworth said he merely wanted the people to 
know by some expression from the Convention, that they 
were in earnest in having professed to be for a division of 
the State at the proper time. The resolution did not con- 
template the creation of a State at this time, but only 
to let the people know why they were reorganizing the 
whole State. As serious objections were made, however, 
he was willing to withdraw the resolution. 

Mr. Vance, of Harrison, hoped he would not withdraw. 
His own people were in favor of an immediate division of 
the State, and had sent him there to assist in that object. 
When the Legislature should meet it was his desire and 
that of his constituents to divide the State. 

Mr. Tarr, of Brooke, said the first inquiry should be, 
Have we a State government ? If not, let us first procure 
the endorsement of the Federal government, and then pro- 
vide the ways and means for a division of the State. 

Mr. Vance was perfectly aware, and so were the peo- 
ple, that the first object is to maintain the government and 
secure its perpetuity; but the resolution before them did 



THE JUNE CONVENTION. 323 

not contemplate that the State be divided until that had 
been accomplished. What they wanted was to show that 
division is the ulterior object. 

CAELILE SAYS NOT OPPORTUNE. 

But why at this time, asked Mr. Carlile, when we are 
surrounded by most embarrassing circumstances, due to our 
own embarrassments? * * * The truth should always be 
spoken when we speak at all; but the whole truth should not 
always be spoken. * * * What if we do contemplate a 
division of the State, would it forward the object to promulgate 
the declaration in a special and authoritative manner? In an 
hour like this, when the question is, Shall we save the State; 
when we are particularly helpless to save ourselves; when the 
very Government itself has by this rebellion been bankrupted; 
when it is engaged in this life and death struggle to maintain 
its own existence; and when we have come here to aid if we can 
in this struggle — why should we now be discussing that which 
Is utterly impossible and which more belongs to days of peace 
than to hours of war? If we could divide the State to-day, who 
would desire to do so under existing circumstances? In a short 
time the power of this Government may be established. Then 
we may be acknowledged as the government of Virginia and 
may provide for that which is essential to our interests. "When 
we are trying now to resist this attempt at transferring us to a 
rebellious government, shall we be distracted with measures of 
secondary importance, as all must admit this question of separa- 
tion to be at this hour? 

Daniel Frost, of Jackson, moved to refer the resolu- 
tions to a special committee with instructions to report 
an address to the people of Virginia. Dr. Dorsey moved 
to table but withdrew at the suggestion of his colleague, 
Mr. Snyder. Mr. Tarr renewed the motion to table and 
it was carried by 50 to 17. Twenty-one members were 
absent. This was the end of division discussion for the 
June session. 



324 THE re::^ding of Virginia. 

Resolutions of respect for the late Stephen A. Douglas, 
whose death had then just occurred, were moved bj George 
Harrison, of Ohio, a Douglas Democrat, and adopted. 

EEOEGANIZATIOlSr. 

The ordinance for the reorganization of the State gov- 
ernment came up next day, the 19th; and during con- 
sideration of it, Mr. West, of Wetzel, proposed an amend- 
ment making persons who had voted to ratify the ordinance 
of secession '^ineligible to hold any post or office of honor 
or profit, civil or military, in this State during the exis- 
tence of hostilities by the seceding States against the gov- 
ernment of the United States." The motion received only 
ten votes. The ordinance having been slightly amended, 
was then adopted by unanimous vote of those present, 76, 
in shape as follows : 

AN ORDINANCE for the Re-organization of the State Govern- 
ment. 
The People of the State of Virginia, by their Delegates 

assembled in Convention at Wheeling, do ordain as follows: 

1. A Governor, Lieutenant-Governor and Attorney-General 
for the State of Virginia, shall be appointed by this Convention, 
to discharge the duties and exercise the powers which pertain 
to their respective offices by the existing laws of the State, and 
to continue in office for six months, or until their successors 
be elected and qualified; and the General Assembly is required 
to provide by law for an election of Governor and Lieutenant- 
Governor by the people as soon as in their judgment such elec- 
tion can be properly held. 

2. A Council, to consist of five members, shall be ap- 
pointed by this Convention, to consult with and advise the Gov- 
ernor, respecting such matters pertaining to his ofiicial duties 



THE JUNE CONVENTION. 325 

as he shall submit for consideration, and to aid in the execu- 
tion of his official orders. Their term of office shall expire at the 
same time as that of the Governor. 

3. The Delegates elected to the General Assembly on the 
twenty-third day of May last, and the Senators entitled under 
existing laws to seats in the next General Assembly, together 
with such Delegates and Senators as may be duly elected under 
the Ordinances of this Convention, or existing laws, to fill 
vacancies, who shall qualify themselves by taking the oath or 
affirmation hereinafter set forth, shall constitute the Legislature 
of the State, to discharge the duties and exercise the powers per- 
taining to the General Assembly. They shall hold their offices 
from the passage of this Ordinance until the end of the terms 
for which they were respectively elected. They shall assemble 
in the City of Wheeling, on the first day of July next, and 
proceed to organize themselves as prescribed by existing laws, 
in their respective branches. A majority in each branch of the 
members qualified as aforesaid, shall constitute a quorum to do 
business. A majority of the members of each branch thus quali- 
fied, voting affirmatively, shall be competent to pass any act 
specified in the twenty-seventh Section of the fourth Article of 
the Constitution of the State. 

4. The Governor, Lieutenant-Governor, Attorney-General, 
members of the Legislature, and all officers now in the service 
of the State, or of any county, city or town thereof, or here- 
after to be elected or appointed for such service, including the 
Judges and Clerks of the several Courts, Sheriffs, Commissioners 
of the Revenue, Justices of the Peace, officers of city and 
municipal corporations, and officers of militia, and officers and 
privates of volunteer companies of the State, not mustered into 
the service of the United States, shall each take the following 
oath or affirmation before proceeding in the discharge of their 
several duties: 

"I solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support the Con- 
stitution of the United States, and the laws made in pur- 
suance thereof, as the supreme law of the land, any thing 
in the Constitution and laws of the State of Virginia, or in the 
Ordinances of the Convention which assembled at Richmond on 
the 13th of February, 1861, to the contrary notwithstanding; 



826 THE EENDIISTG OF VIRGINIA. 

and that I will uphold and defend the Government of Virginia 
as vindicated and restored by the Convention which assembled 
at Wheeling on the 11th day of June, 1861." 

5. If any elective officer who is required by the preceding 
section to take such oath or affirmation, fail or refuse so to do, 
it shall be the duty of the Governor, upon satisfactory evidence 
of the fact, to issue his writ declaring the office to be vacant, 
and providing for a special election to fill such vacancy, at some 
convenient and early day to be designated in said writ; of which 
due publication shall be made for the information of the per- 
sons entitled to vote at such election; and such writ may be 
directed, at the discretion of the Governor, to the Sheriff or 
Sheriffs of the proper county or counties, or to a Special Com- 
missioner or Commissioners to be named by the Governor for 
the purpose. If the officer who fails or refuses to take such oath 
or affirmation be appointed by the Governor he shall fill the 
vacancy without writ, but if such officer be appointed otherwise 
than by the Governor or by election, the writ shall be issued by 
the Governor directed to the appointing power, requiring it to 
fill the vacancy. 

VANCE DISCEENS A STAK-CHAMBEE. 

In the afternoon was passed an ordinance for "appre- 
hending suspicious persons," having first been amended, 
on motion of Mr. Lamb, to provide ''that the powers vested 
in the Governor by this ordinance shall be exercised only 
upon satisfactory evidence and with concurrence of a 
majority of his Council." When it came to the vote, Mr. 
Vance denied the power of the Convention to pass such 
an ordinance. He did not want to make such a star-cham- 
ber of this Convention as had been done at Kichmond. 
This was a matter that belonged entirely to the Legisla- 
ture and should be left for its action. If this Convention 
were to do all the legislating for the State, there would be 
no need of a Legislature at all. 



THE JUNE CONVENTION. 327 

Mr. Lamb replied that by the action of the May Cou- 
vention the people had authorized this body "to devise such 
measures aud take such action" as the safety and welfare 
of the people they represented might demand. That was 
their authority, and they all knew the exigencies of the 
times did demand that they should take this action. 

Mr. Burdett remarked that in revolutionary times like 
these they could not and must not be bound down to the 
strict letter of laws and constitutions. For his part, he 
meant to take his share of the responsibility. The ordi- 
nance was passed w^ith but three votes against : President 
Boreman, Vance and Williamson. 

TO VACATE OFFICES. 

N'ext day Dr. Dorsey moved a resolution to instruct 
the Committee on Business to report an ordinance "declar- 
ing vacant the offices of all office-holders in the Common- 
wealth who voted for the ordinance of secession." Mr. 
Crane suggested that this be made a resolution of inquiry 
only. He opposed it on the ground that many voted for 
the ordinance who now heartily support this movement, 
and there were office-holders who did not vote for it who 
were bitter Secessionists. Dr. Dorsey had no confidence 
in the Unionism of anybody who had voted for the ordi- 
nance. He believed those who would be left in the offices 
unless something like this were adopted, would give them 
a great deal of trouble. Mr. West supported the resolu- 
tion as in line with the amendment offered by him yester- 
day. In his county, which had given a majority of seven 



328 THE REXDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

hundred against the ordinance, all the officers were Seces- 
sionists. He wanted to restore the reputation of his peo- 
ple, who had been proclaimed at Richmond as for dis- 
union. He wanted the world to know that Wetzel County 
was not represented in this Convention by Leonard S. 
Hall. 

SIGNING THE DECLAEATION. 

The hour having arrived for the formality of the sign- 
ing of the declaration, the document having been en- 
grossed on parchment was first signed by the President and 
laid on the Secretary's table. The members as their names ' 
were called by the secretary in the order of counties came 
forward and sigiied, one at a time, and retired to their 
seats, all the other members remaining seated till called. 
All the members jDresent, 83 in number, thus came for- 
ward and signed. Henry C. Moore, of Webster, who was 
admitted in the afternoon session, signed afterwards. 

The declaration and signatures, as they appear in the 
official journal of the Convention are as follows : 

A DECLARATION OF THE PEOPLE OF VIRGINIA. 

The true purpose of all government is to promote the wel- 
fare and provide for the protection and security of the governed; 
and when any form or organization of government proves inade- 
quate for or subversive of this purpose, it is the right, it is the 
duty, of the latter to alter or abolish it. The Bill of Rights of 
Virginia, framed in 1776, reaflBrmed in 1830, ?nd again in 1851, 
expressly reserves this right to the majority of her people. The 
act of the General Assembly calling the Convention which, 
assembled at Richmond in February last, without the previously 
expressed consent of such majority, was therefore a usurpation; 
and the Convention thus called has not only abused the powers 



THE JUNE CONVENTION". 329 

nominally entrusted to it but, with the connivance and active 
aid of the Executive, has usurped and exercised other powers 
to the manifest injury of the people, which, if permitted, will 
inevitably subject them to military despotism. 

The Convention by its pretended ordinances has required 
the people of Virginia to separate from and wage war against 
the Government of the United States and against the citizens of 
neighboring States with whom we have heretofore maintained 
friendly, social and business relations. 

It has attempted to subvert the Union founded by Washing- 
ton and his co-patriots in the purer days of the Republic, which 
has conferred unexampled prosperity upon every class of citizens 
and upon every section of the country. 

It has attempted to transfer the allegiance of the people to 
an illegal confederacy of rebellious States and required their sub- 
mission to its pretended edicts and decrees. 

It has attempted to place the whole military force and mili- 
tary operations of the Commonwealth under the control and 
direction of such confederacy for offensive as well as defensive 
purposes. 

It has, in conjunction with the State Executive, instituted 
wherever their usurped power extends a reign of terror intended 
to suppress the free expression of the will of the people, making 
elections a mockery and a fraud. * 

The same combination, even before the passage of the pre- 
tended ordinance of secession, instituted war by the seizure and 
appropriation of the property of the Federal Government and 
by organizing and mobilizing armies with the avowed purpose of 
capturing or destroying the capital of the Union. 

They have attempted to bring the allegiance of the people 
of the United States into direct conflict with their subordinate 
allegiance to the State, thereby making obedience to their pre- 
tended ordinances treason against the former. 

We, therefore, the delegates here assembled in Convention 
to devise such measures and take such action as the safety and 
welfare of the loyal citizens of Virginia may demand, having 
maturely considered the premises and viewing with great con- 
cern the deplorable condition to which this once happy Com- 
monwealth must be reduced unless some regular, adequate 
remedy is speedily adopted, and appealing to the Supreme Ruler 



330 



THE BENDING OF VIRGINIA. 



of the Universe for the rectitude of our intentions, do hereby, 
in the name and on behalf of the good people of Virginia, 
solemnly declare that the preservation of their dearest rights and 
liberties and their security in person and property imperatively 
demand the reorganization of the government of the Common- 
wealth; and that all acts of said Convention and Executive tend- 
ing to separate this Commonwealth from the United States, or 
to levy and carry on war against them, are without authority 
and void; and that the offices of all who adhere to the said 
Convention and Executive, whether legislative, executive or 
judicial, are vacated. 



Arthur I. Boreman, 
J. H. Shuttlesworth, 
Nathan H. Taft, 
Joseph C. Gist, 
W. I. Boreman, 
Chapman J. Stuart, 
Daniel D. Johnson, 
James A. Foley, 
George McC. Porter, 
J. H. Atkinson, 
W. L. Crawford, 
Charles B. Waggoner, 
D. Polsley, 
Leroy Kramer, 
Jos. Snider, 
R. L. Berkshire, 
Wm. Price, 
James Evans, 
|D. B. Dorsey, 
Thos. H. Logan, 
And. Wilson, 
Daniel Lamb, 
Wm. W. Brumfield, 
Wm. H. Copley, 
Jas. G. West, Sr., 
Reuben Martin, 
Jas. P. Ferrell, 
Henry Newman, 



Richard Fast, 
F. Smith, 

Francis H. Peirpoint, 
John S. Barnes, 
A. F. Ritchie, 
Jas. O. Watson, 
Remembrance Swan, 
E. H. Caldwell, 
Thos. Morris, 
Lewis Wetzel, 
J. W. Paxton, 
Geo. Harrison, 
C. D. Hubbard, 
Jas. W. Williamson, 
C. W. Smith, 
Wm. H. Douglas, 
Chas. Hooton, 
W. B. Zinn. 
W. B. Crane, 
John Howard, 
H. Hagans, 
Jno. J. Brown, 
S. Parsons, 
Samuel Crane, 
T. A. Roberts, 
L. E. Davidson, 
John S. Burdett, 
Samuel B. Todd, 



THE JUNE CONVENTION. 331 

E. T. Graham, D. D. T. Farnsworth, 

J. W. Moss, John Hawxhurst, 

P. G. VanWinkle, Evan E. Mason, 

H. S. Martin, Jas. Carskadon, 

Jas. Titus Close, O. D. Downey, 

John S. Carlile, Geo. W. Broski, 

Solomon S. Fleming, J. H, Trout, 

Lot Bowen, Jas. I. Barrick, 

B. F. Shuttles-worth, H. W. Crothers, 

Daniel Frost, Jno. D. Nichols, 

J. F. Scott, Campbell Tarr, 

A. Flesher, Jno. Love, 

P. M. Hale, Henry H. Withers, 

J. A. J. Lightburn, Henry C. Moore. 

An order was made, on motion of Mr. Close, of Alex- 
andria, that a copy of the Declaration and signatures be 
sent to the President of the United States by special mes- 
sengers to be designated by the President of the Conven- 
tion. 

STATE OFFICEKS CHOSEN. 

In the afternoon session, the Convention proceeded to 
elect State officers under operation of the ordinance 
adopted the day before. The following were unanimously 
chosen : 

For Governor — Francis H. Peirpoint. 

For Lieut. -Governor — Daniel Polsley. 

For Governor's Council — Peter G. Van Winkle, 

William A. Harrison, 
William Leasure, 
Daniel Lamb, 
James W. Paxton. 

The choice of an Attorney General was deferred until 
Saturday. 



332 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

THE OATH THEY TOOK. 

Messrs. Carlile and Lamb were appointed to wait upon 
Governor Peirpoint and inform him of his election. The 
Governor soon after ajjpeared in the hall, and the oaths 
of office were administered to him, in the presence of the 
Convention, by Andrew Wilson, a justice of the peace for 
Ohio Count V. The form of oath administered to the State 
officers, as revised by the Committee on Business and ac- 
cepted by the Convention, was the following: 

I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support the 
Constitution of the United States and the laws made in pursu- 
ance thereof as the supreme law of the land, anything in the 
constitution and laws of the State of Virginia, or in the ordi- 
nances of the Convention which assembled in Richmond on the 
13th day of February last, to the contrary notwithstanding; and 
that I will uphold and defend the government of Virginia as 
vindicated and restored by the Convention which assembled in 
Wheeling on the 11th day of June, 1861„ 

ADDRESS BY THE GOVERNOR. 

Governor Peirpoint, by invitation, ascended to the 
President's stand and made a brief address. He said that 
for three-quarters of a century the government of the 
United States had rested upon the intelligence of the peo- 
ple and on the theory that in the people resides all power. 
But a new doctrine had been introduced by those at the 
head of the revolution in the Southern States. They try 
to divide the people into two classes — the laboring class 
and the capitalistic class. They had for several years been 
industriously propagating the idea that capital ought to 
control the legislation of the country, maintaining that 
it was dangerous for labor to enter into legislation. 



THE JUNE CONVENTION. 333 

They maintain that the ballot should be wielded only 
by the educated classes and labor excluded from any voice 
in the shaping of legislation. This idea had been covertly 
advanced in only portions of Virginia. Up to within a 
short time she had stood firm by the doctrines of the 
fathers. But now the propagators of this new doctrine had 
attempted to force it upon them by terror and at the point 
of the bayonet. "We have been driven," he said, "into the 
position we occupy to-day by the usurpers at the South 
who have inaugurated this war upon the soil of Virginia 
and have made it the great Crimea of this contest, which 
has been inaugurated with a view of making the distinc- 
tion indicated. We are but adhering to the great funda- 
mental principle of our fathers, that to the loyal people 
of a State belongs the law-making power of that State. 
It is the assumption of that authority upon which we are 
now about to enter." 

EX POST FACTO. 

After the retirement of the Governor, Dr. Dorsey 
withdrew his resolution in regard to vacating the offices 
of those who had voted for secession to make way for an- 
other likely to better harmonize the views of the members. 

Mr. Carlile, by general consent, wished to say for the 
consideration of those who favored such propositions as 
Dr. Dorsey's that they violated the spirit of the Constitu- 
tion of the United States, being equivalent to an ex post 
facto law. At the time the men whom it was proposed to 
turn out of office voted for the ordinance of secession, na 
penalty attached to the act ; and this depriving them of a 



334 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

prerogative on account of that vote was equivalent to es- 
tablishing a penalty. To inflict a penalty for having exer- 
cised a guaranteed right would be to abridge that right. 
It would never do to inaugairate any such rule in a body 
assembled for the purpose of protecting the rights and 
liberties of a free people. 

Dr. Dorsey said it was not the design to inflict punish- 
ment but to protect the people for the future against offi- 
cial acts of those who had committed themselves to a doc- 
trine and a series of projects inimical to the rights of the 
people. 

Mr. Stuart, of Doddridge, said it was the first time 
he had ever heard that a man holding an office under the 
Constitution of the United States had a right to vote for 
an ordinance of secession. Such an act was a violation 
of the oath taken by all officers to support that Constitu- 
tion, and was therefore a crime and a perjury. 

Mr. Carlile replied that if it was perjury, the prose- 
cuting attorneys ought to enforce the punishment of per- 
jury, which would disquality from holding any office 
thereafter. 

The following morning Dr. Dorsey moved for a "Com- 
mittee on Offices," to whom all propositions in regard to 
vacating offices could be referred; but the matter was al- 
lowed to lie over until the next week ; and the Convention 
proceeded to pass an ordinance relating to receipts and 
disbursements and providing for the appointment of audi- 
tor and secretary of the Commonwealth. The Convention 
then went into the election for Attorney General, and 
chose Col. James S, Wheat, of Wheeling. Mr. Flesher 



THE JUNE CONVENTION. 335 

offered a resolution for reference looking to the establish- 
ment of Federal recruiting stations in each county. 

ARMS BROUGHT TO WHEELING. 

Mr. Burdett suggested an inquiry regarding the dispo- 
sition to be made of the 2,000 stand of arms now in the 
city. Mr. Carlile said the committee were unanimous in 
the conclusion that they should be handed over to the State 
authorities here for arming the volunteer militia of the 
State which would be organized in a few days. These were 
the arms shipped to Wellsburg at the instance of the 
Brooke County delegation who went to Washington. Mr. 
Burdett had proposed that as there was no possibility of 
the guns being needed at Wellsburg they be brought to 
Wheeling and utilized in arming the volunteers; and he 
with some others of the members went to Wellsburg and 
arranged for the reshipment of the arms, coming down 
with them on the boat and landing them on Wheeling 
Island. 

THE CONVENTION RESTS. 

On Tuesday, the 25th of June, the twelfth day of the 
sitting, a resting-place in the work having been reached, 
the Convention, having arranged for earlier recall if 
needed, adjourned to the 6th of August. Mr. Farnsworth 
had sought to have the adjournment made subject to recall 
by the Governor, so that if matters should not be in trim 
for the resumption of, work when Augiist 6th came around, 
the reassembling could be deferred to a later day j but the 
suggestion did not meet with favor. 



536 THE KENDING OF VIEGINIA. 



RICHMOND REVIEWED. 



In his parting remarks to the Convention, President 
Boreman noted that thirty-four counties were represented, 
a territpry embracing almost one- third of the white popu- 
lation of Virginia. Their work, he said, had been well 
done ; and it now only remained to go home and assist in 
putting the government they had restored into effective 
operation. On the day of the adjournment an address 
issued by order of the Convention was promulgated. It 
embraced a careful and able review of events at Richmond, 
including this interesting paragraph : 

The proceedings of the Richmond Convention up to the 
17th of April were evidently intended by those in the secret 
to persuade the members favorable to the perpetuity of the 
Union, and the people at large, that it was intended to propose 
terms on which it could be maintained. On the day named, the 
mask was thrown aside and the ordinance of secession passed. 
This was done in secret session, and no immediate promulgation 
of the facts was made to the people; nor until since this Con- 
vention assembled was the injunction of secrecy so far removed 
that the vote on the passage of the ordinance was made public. 
It now appears that more than one-third of the whole convention 
voted against it, an4,ihat nine members were absent. Up to this 
time the debates which preceded the vote are concealed from the 
people, who are thus denied a knowledge of the causes which in 
the opinion of the majority rendered secession necessary and 
justified so gross a disregard of their lately expressed will. 



CHAPTER XI. 

CHEERFUL OUTLOOK FOR THE NEW GOVERN- 
MENT—THE LEGISLATURE; ELECTION 
OF SENATORS. 

THE EXECUTIVE IN HARNESS. 

In its issue of June 24th, the InteUigencer took this 
cheerful view of the work of reorganization : 

"Governor Peirpoint and his Council are hard at work 
each day and much of the night in maturing important 
business. The questions of revenue, militia and general 
ways and means are being rapidly matured. Our people 
will soon be able to see that we have earnest men at work." 
The editor proceeds to pay a merited tribute to one of 
them, Daniel Lamb, who, he says, "is, with all his heart 
and soul, at work in the good cause. From the very first 
he has signalized his devotion to the movement by will- 
ingly taking on himself no inconsiderable share of the 
drudgery." 

SKIES ARE BRIGHT. 

The editor recites further the auspicious circumstances 
attending the inauguration of the Restored Government: 

Va.-22 337 



338 THE RENDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

The building of the. United States custom-house in this city 
(finished in 1859) was a fortunate thing for the new government 
inaugurated last week by the Convention. It is nothing more 
nor less than a fine State-house — a good deal finer than the one 
tenanted by the traitors at Richmond. The magnificent United 
States court-room is just the hall for the Convention and will 
be just the place for the Legislature when the Convention ad- 
journs; and if the two bodies sit at the same time — which we 
presume they will — there is a fine capacious chamber on the 
floor beneath, quite the thing for the latter body. Then the 
different committee rooms, Governor's room, etc., seem almost 
to have been made to order. We never could see before what all 
these fine rooms were for. Already we have a finer capitol than 
they have — or had — at Montgomery; and much better, as we said, 
than they have at Richmond. 

The new government starts out auspiciously if ever govern- 
ment did. Its declaration passed by the identical vote given 
for the Declaration of Independence, and its passage uncon- 
sciously immemorialed the eventful anniversary of Bunker Hill. 

And more than this, the new government finds itself with 
an army in the field; with the whole strength of the Federal 
Government at its back; with a revenue ready supplied from 
payments already collected by the sheriffs; with all the loyal 
State wishing it God-speed and with every possible circumstance 
in its favor. 

THE LEGISLATURE CONVENES. 

Those members of the General Assembly of Virginia 
who adhered to the United States met, in response to proc- 
lamation of Governor Peirpoint, in the city of Wheeling 
July 2, 1861 — the House of Delegates in the Federal 
court-room in the custom-house, the Senate in tlie Linsley 
Institute, corner of Fifth and Center Streets. In the 
House, the roll was called by Col. Leroy Kramer, of Mon- 
onaalia, and Gibson L. Cranmer elected permanent clerk. 



RECOGiSriTIOX BY XATIOXAL EXECUTIVE. 339 

In the Senate, Lieutenant-Governor Polsley presided, and 
William M. Lewis, of Doddridge, was chosen permanent 
Secretary. 

RECOGNITION AT WASHINGTON. 

The Governor's message was read at an evening ses- 
sion in both houses. He transmitted with it correspon- 
dence between himself and the authorities of the United 
States, showing that June 21st he had addressed to the 
President a formal letter setting forth the conditions in 
Virginia and asking for ''military force to aid in suppress- 
ing the rebellion and to protect the good people of this 
Commonwealth from domestic violence." 

The reply came from the Secretary of War, Simon 
Cameron, who was directed by the President to say : "A 
large additional force will soon be sent to your relief." 
The correspondence, of course, long post-dates the move- 
ment of troops to Grafton in the later days of May, by 
which the ISTorthwest had been relieved from the presence 
of Porterfield's and Garnett's forces. Secretary Cameron's 
letter is somewhat discursive: 

The full extent of the conspiracy against popular rights 
which has culminated in the atrocities to which you refer was 
not known when its outbreak took place at Charleston. It now 
appears that it was matured for many years by secret organiza- 
tions throughout the country, especially in the slave States. By 
this means when the President called upon Virginia in April 
for its quota of troops then deemed necessary to put it down 
in the states in which it had shown itself in arms, the call was 
responded to by the chief Confederate in Virginia by an order 
to his armed followers to seize the Navy Yard at Gosport; and 
the authorities of the State, who had until then shown 
repugnance to the plot, found themselves stripped of all actual 



340 THE EEXDING OF VIRGINIA. 

power and were manifestly permitted to retain the empty foi'ms 
of office only because they consented to use them at the bidding 
of the invaders. The President, however, never supposed that 
a brave and free people, though surprised and unarmed, could 
long be subjugated by a class of political adventurers always 
adverse to them; and the fact that they have already rallied, 
reorganized their government and checked the march of these 
invaders demonstrates how justly he appreciates them. 

The letter concludes : 

Instructions have now been given to the agents of the Fed- 
eral Government to proceed hereafter under your directions, and 
the company and field officers will be commissioned by you. 

There was also a formal letter from Hon. Caleb B. 
Smith, Secretary of the Interior, certifying to the number 
of representatives in Congress Virginia was entitled to 
under the last census. 

REVIEW BY THE GOVERNOR. 

Governor Peirpoint, in his message, addressed himself 
first to the matter of chief and immediate importance: 

It is my painful duty to announce that the late Executive 
of the State, with a large part of the State officers, civil and 
military, are at war with the loyal people of Virginia and the 
Constitutional government of the United States. They have 
leagued themselves together with persons from other States to 
tear down the benign governments. State and Federal, have insti- 
tuted Civil War in our midst and created a system of terror 
around us. * * * 

Last November at the Presidential election the State gave 
upwards of sixteen thousand majority for Bell and Douglas, both 
Union candidates for the Presidency. Their principal com- 
petitor was proclaimed as also true to the Union; and throughout 
the canvass any imputation of favoring disunion was indignantly 
denied by the advocates of all the candidates. At the election 



ELECTION OF SENATORS. 341 

for members of the Convention in February a majority of over 
sixty thousand votes was given to the Union candidates and 
with equal unanimity in favor of "Reference." Yet the dele* 
gates in that Convention passed the ordinance and attached the 
State to the Southern league called the Confederate States; and 
to render the step irretrievable and defeat the whole object of 
requiring the ratification by the people, put this action into 
effect immediately; and a month before the vote was to be taken 
on the question of ratification transferred the whole military 
forces ot our State to the President of the Confederacy and sur- 
rendered to him military possession of our territory. 

It is claimed the ordinance of secession was ratified by a 
majority of ninety thousand votes. Had the people of Virginia 
then so greatly changed? The best evidence that they had not 
Is found in the fact that wherever the vote was really free 
there was a much larger majority against secession than was 
given in February to the Union candidates. Intimidation and 
violence were resorted to over a large portion of the State. The 
same reign of terror which compelled Union men to vote as they 
did in the Convention was brought to bear on the people them- 
selves. Vast numbers were obliged by intimidation and force 
of threatened violence to vote for secession. Many did not vote 
at all. Many were no doubt influenced by the consideration that 
the measures already adopted had placed the Commonwealth 
helplessly within the grasp of the President of the Southern 
Confederacy, and that she could not escape from this power by 
the rejection of the ordinance. 

The Governor recited at some length the proceedings 
that had resulted in the reorganization of the State gov- 
ernment and bringing the Legislature together to complete 
the . work. 

CHOOSING SENATORS. 

In the second day's session, it was agreed to proceed 
on the succeeding Tuesday to the election of United States 
senators to fill the places of Hunter and Mason. In the 



342 THE EENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

issue of July 9th, the Intelligencer came out with a vigor- 
ous editorial favoring the election of Mr. Carlile to one of 
these places, but expressed no preference as to the other: 

Can any man give a good reason why Mr. Carlile should not 
be elected? If it is an honor he is entitled to it. If it is a posi- 
tion of profit, he is entitled to it. If it is a place of work and 
responsibility, he is capable and fitted for it. He has experi- 
ence, ability, enjoys the influence and confidence of the govern- 
ment at Washington equal to, if not beyond, any man in Western 
Virginia. Where is the man who has done as much in the 
movement now so far along on its successful accomplishment as 
Mr. Carlile? He has led the van. He and his patriotic friends 
of Harrison called the Convention in that county; which, in 
turn, called the Wheeling Convention of the 13th of May; which 
in turn again called the Convention of the 11th of June; and this 
latter Convention called into being the present State government. 
Mr. Carlile has been a leader — a bold and persevering one. If 
any other public man among us can present equal claims, we do 
not know it; neither do the people. He is emphatically a repre- 
sentative man in this movement and the world inside and 
outside of his acquaintance so recognizes him. If such a man 
is to be overslaughed, then all premium upon patriotic bold- 
ness and energy and ability is set aside and he is to stand forth 
as another proof of the lesson of history that "pioneers labor 
and their successors enter into their rest." 

The Legislature in the early part of the day appointed 
Samuel Crane to be State Auditor and Campbell Tarr 
State Treasurer. In the afternoon they elected the sena- 
tors. Mr. Carlile was chosen to fill Hunter's place by 
the unanimous vote of both houses, no nomination having 
been made against him in either. Somewhat to the sur- 
prise of the public, the other senatorship was given to 
Waitman T. Willey, over Van Winkle and Lamb. Mr. 
Willey received twenty-two votes on the joint ballot; the 
other eight each. Mr. Willey had taken no part in the 
work of reorganization but had seemed to hold aloof. In 



CAPTURE OF A GOLDEN FLEECE. 34§ 

the May Convention he had hekl a rather obstrnctive atti- 
tnde and had declined to serve on the Committee on Fed- 
eral Relations. There was a widespread feeling outside 
the Legislature that there had been nothing in Mr. Wil- 
ley's attitude or service, either in the Richmond Conven- 
tion or afterwards, to entitle him to this high distinction 
over men like Lamb and Van Winkle. 

EXPEDITION TO COLCHIS. 

July 1st, Governor Peirpoint authorized Capt. John 
List, of Wheeling, to go to Weston and take possession of 
$30,000 State funds held in bank there for the w^ork of 
constructing the Hospital for the Insane. It was deemed 
prudent to have the money in a safer depository. The 
object being made known to the military authorities. Col- 
onel Tyler of the Seventh Ohio Regiment was directed to 
accompany Captain List to Weston and enforce the de- 
mand for the money. They left Clarksburg Sunday even- 
ing and arrived in W^eston next morning. Colonel Tyler 
took possession of the town, and Captain List went to the 
bank and demanded the money in the name of the Com- 
monwealth — somewhat as Ethan Allen demanded the sur- 
render of Ticonderoga in the name of Jehovah and the 
Continental Congress. As his backing was good, no resis- 
tance was made and the money was handed over in gold, 
except between two and three thousand dollars then due 
for labor and material on the hospital ; which, after due 
evidence of the claim, was left for payment to those en- 
titled to it. The residue was taken to Wheeling and de- 
posited in the JSTorthwestern Bank. It was afterwards 
appropriated for the v/ork on the hospital. 



CHAPTER XII. 

RECOGNITION OF THE REORGANIZED GOVERN- 
MENT BY THE SENATE. 

DELAWARE OBJECTS TO THE NEW SENATOES. 

The credentials of Messrs. Carlile and Willej were 
presented in the Senate bj Senator Andrew Johnson, of 
Tennessee, July 25th. Mr. Bayard, of Delaware, pro- 
tested against receiving them. "You are undertaking," 
he said, "to recognize a government of the State of Vir- 
ginia which is not the regular State government. Even 
though the State may be in what you call a state of rebel- 
lion, you are bound to take notice of the fact that Mr. 
Letcher is Governor of Virginia. * * * Jf jqu say 
he is in rebellion, that does not authorize a portion of the 
people of Virginia to form a legislature for the purpose of 
electing senators to take seats in this body. You have no 
authority to create a new State out of part of an existing 
State." He moved the reference of the credentials to the 
Committee on the Judiciary. A discussion ensued in 
which Senators Johnson, Trumbull, Hale, Ten Eyck and 
Collamer affirmed the propriety of accepting the creden- 
tials and Senators Saulsbury and Powell seconded by Mr. 
Bayard, denied. Mr. Saulsbury called attention to the 
fact that only two days before the Senate had adopted a 
resolution expelling Mason and Hunter from the Senate, 



BECOGNITION BY THE SENATE. 345 

whereas these credentials showed that the election of 
Messrs. Carlile and Willev had taken place two days before 
that, and therefore before any vacancies existed. Mr. 
Trumbull said it was usual to elect senators before the 
actual occurrence of the vacancies to be filled. He said 
the Governor's certificates prima facie entitled these gen- 
tlemen to be sworn in. If the Senate were to go back of 
the prima facie certificates, then they must take notice 
of the fact that a portion of the people of Virginia had 
risen in arms against the government; that another por- 
tion was loyal to the Union, had elected a legislature, seek 
representation in Congress and are entitled to it. 

Mr. Bayard claimed that to admit these gentlemen 
would be to recognize an insurrection in a State for the 
purpose of overthrowing the State government by a very 
small minority of its people. 

NEW HAMPSHIRE WELCOMES THEM. 

Mr. Hale said that instead of recog-nizing an insur- 
rection, it would be recognizing the loyal and true men 
of the State who still cling to the Union and support the 
Constitution. It was no time to stand on form or cere- 
mony. It was a question of life or death with the Re- 
public, which could not live a day after they yielded to 
the position of the Secessionists. It had come to the very 
last point where they must either vindicate the government 
or go out of national existence forever. It was a contest 
that had been going on through all time between despotism 
and constitutional government with liberty — the battle of 
all past ages and all coming generations, culminating in 



346 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

the experiment we are making to-dav. If senators hesi- 
tated to meet the issue in all its asjoects, in all its contin- 
gencies, on this floor, on the field of battle, and every- 
where, they would be unworthy of the day and hour in 
which God Almighty had ]3ermitted them to enact the 
part he had assigned them in the great chapter of human 
destiny. For his part, he was 'glad he had been born 
when he was, so that his lines had fallen here to-day — 
glad his destiny was linked with the great contest that had 
been coming, coming, coming with every successive gener- 
ation and every successive experiment that the world had 
ever made in all the past." It was no time to hunt up 
justice of the peace records to find precedents. They 
must accept the contest as it had come — anomalous and 
destitute of precedents but destined to shed an infinite 
light on the future. In such a contest, the only question 
he asked was : "Is your heart right ? If it be, join 
with us in this great struggle." If there are loyal men 
in Virginia determined to stand by the cause of civil 
liberty in this hour of peril, let them come. 

The vote on admitting the Virginia senators was 35 
to 5 — the latter being Bayard, Bright, Polk, Powell and 
Saulsbury. 



CHAPTEE XIII. 

THE AUGUST CONVENTION— PREPARING FOR 
DIVISION. 

CASH IN HAND. 

The day the Convention reassembled, the Intelligencer 
said : 

The success of cur new State government is beyond the most 
sanguine expectations of its warmest friends. Every day more 
and more demonstrates the wisdom that governed the councils 
of its reorganization. The news comes in constantly that peo- 
ple by counties and by communities, wherever our victorious 
arms have spread, are gladly rallying to its support and defense. 
Company after company, both in State and United States 
service, are being mustered in, and ere the summer is gone we 
shall see some ten thousand of the true and patriotic sons of 
Western Virginia in the field under the glorious flag of our 
country. 

The editor comments on the financial success of the 
new government. The taxes paid were already beyond 
its needs ; and the Federal government had jnst paid over 
in gold upwards of $40,000, due the State by the distribu- 
tion of 1841 from sales of public lands, now worth in 
current funds some $44,000 to $45,000. 

Yet these prosperous conditions were not very old. 
When the restoration had been completed by the Conven- 
tion the treasury of the restored government was, of course, 

647 



348 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

empty. Governor Peirpoint and Mr. Van Winkle had 
been obliged to borrow from the Wheeling banks on their 
personal endorsement, and had in this way raised $10,000. 

COMMITTEE ON DIVISION. 

August 6th the Convention came together again, to 
resume the work before it. Immediately after prayer, Mr. 
West of Wetzel offered a resolution to raise a committee 
of one from each county to take into consideration the 
whole subject of a division of the State, as a basis for 
action by the Convention. The proposition was agreed 
to and later the committee appointed as follows: 

West, of Wetzel. Gather, of Taylor. 

Crawford, of Hancock. Zinn, of Preston. 

Nichols, of Brooke. Parsons, of Tucker. 

W^ilson, of Ohio. Crane, of Randolph, 

Burley, of Marshall. Meyers, of Barbour. 

Johnson, of Tyler. Smith, of Upshur. 

Stuart of Doddridge. Lightburn, of Lewis. 

Williamson, of Pleasants. Withers, of Gilmer. 

Douglas, of Ritchie. Davis, of Harrison. 

Van Winkle, of Wood. Graham, of Wirt. 

Flesher, of Jackson. Slack, of Kanawha. 

Wetzel, of Mason. Trout, of Hampshire. 

Brumfleld, of Wayne. Hawxhurst, of Fairfax, 

Kramer, of Monongalia. Michael, of Hardy. 

Miner, of Alexandria, Koonce, of Jefferson. 
Barnes, of Marion. 

Questions like stay-law, confiscation of rebels' prop- 
erty, increased compensation for sheriffs and collectors, 
were raised and sent to the Committee on Business. 

FARNSWORTH REVERSES. 

In the second day's session, Mr. Farnsworth oiBFered 
this: 



THE AUGUST CONVENTION. 3-1:9 

Whereas, The late Legislature refused to give its consent 
for a- division of the State or the formation of a new State; and, 
whereas, we deem it necessary, in compliance with the Constitu- 
tion of the United States, to have such consent before the crea- 
tion of a new State, therefore 

Resolved, That we deem it unwise at this time for this Con- 
vention to take action for a division of the State, and that when 
it adjourns on Friday next it will adjourn sine die. 

The resolution was laid 'on the table, on motion of 
Mr. West, by a vote of 39 to 25. Mr. Todd of Taylor 
renewed the resolution in substance except that instead of 
proposing an adjournment it declared it inexpedient to 
legislate, and had it referred. 

RICHMOND "void." 

The Business Committee, among other things, reported 

an ordinance, which was passed two days later, declaring 

the proceedings of the Richmond Convention a nullity, in 

these terms : 

That all ordinances, acts, orders, resolutions and other pro- 
ceedings of the Convention which assembled at Richmond on the 
13th day of February last, being without the authority of the 
people of Virginia constitutionally given and in derogation of 
their rights, are hereby declared illegal, inoperative, null, void 
and without force and effect. 

CARLILE ANTICIPATES COMMITTEE. 

On the third day Mr. Carlile submitted resolutions to 
instruct the Business Committee to report an ordinance 
providing for the organization of a separate State em- 
bracing the following counties : 

Jefferson, Berkeley, Morgan, Hampshire, Hardy, Barbour, 
Braxton, Brooke, Cabell, Calhoun, Clay, Doddridge, Gilmer, Han- 
cock, Harrison, Jackson, Kanawha, Lewis, Marion, Marshall, 



350 THE BENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

Mason, Monongalia, Ohio, Pleasants, Preston, Putnam, Randolph 
Ritchie, Roane, Taylor, Tucker, Tyler, Upshur, Wayne, Webster. 
Wetzel, Wirt, and Wood, 38. 

And another ordinance providing that any counties 
"lying contiguous to the boundaries proposed for the new 
State, and whose people shall express a desire to be ad- 
mitted, shall form a part thereof;" and also instructing 
the committee to report ''a constitution and form of gov- 
ernment for the proposed State, to be submitted to the peo- 
ple thereof for ratification or rejection at the polls on the 
fourth Thursday of October next, and that at the same 
time the sense of said voters be taken upon the question 
of the formation of the said new State." Mr. Carlile said 
these resolutions were offered as a sort of test to ascertain 
the sentiment of the Convention. 

WIDE OF THE MAEK. 

If the reader will for a moment consider how much it 
involves to frame an organic law for a State under ordi- 
nary conditions, and then how much more for such a State 
under the surrounding circumstances — about to cut loose 
not only from the parental household but from the old 
rules, laws, systems, traditions, down to the most funda- 
mental bases, and evolve new ones on radically different 
lines, adapted to different ideas and needs — he will re- 
alize how wide of the mark was Mr. Carlile's proposition, 
that a mere committee should, in a few hours or days at 
most, prepare a constitution and form of government for 
such a State. 

Mr. Stuart of Doddridge moved to lay the resolutions 
on the table. Mr. Carlile supported them in an elaborate 



THE AUGUST CONVENTION. 351 

address. He thought the time had now come for action, 
and went over the grounds which prompt a separation un- 
der ordinary circumstances. But the existence of the 
struggle now in progress, he said, suggested additional 
reasons for prompt action. If the result of the war should 
he an agreement for a division of the country into two 
governments — a thing he did not expect, yet something 
that was always within the range of possibility — the ter- 
ritory of Western Virginia might come into controversy 
in the settlement, and it might make a difference in such 
a settlement whether it was a part of the Old Dominion 
or an independent State. He had recently advised delay 
until the Restored Government had been fully recognized. 
The admission of our Senators, he being one, had com- 
pleted that recognition ; and under the decision of the Su- 
preme Court of the United States in the case familiarly 
known as Luther vs. Borden (the Rhode Island case,) 
that question was settled beyond possible controversy. He 
did not think the formation of this territory into an inde- 
])endent State could in any way embarrass the Federal 
government in its operations against the rebellion but 
would rather strengthen its hands. It rested with this 
Convention to initiate the movement, and that was all it 
could do. The Legislature, whose consent was necessary, 
would not reassemble until December. As to the refusal 
of the Legislature at its July session, they had no right — 
at least there was no occasion — to give their consent in ad- 
vance of an application. 'No proper application, could yet 
be made. There was nothing now to prevent this Conven- 
tion taking the initiatory steps. Let us ascertain the sense 
of the people within the boundaries proposed, lay before 



352 ■ THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

them the form of government you expect to extend over 
them, and if they desire it, their servants in the Legis- 
lature can give their consent. Mr. Carlile concluded his 
address in these wor.ds: 

Under the incubus of a false political philosophy, we have 
here been digging, in an almost primitive state, from the 
bowels of the earth, the necessary means of support, while nature 
has filled us to overflowing with all the elements of wealth 
seeking nothing in the world but the hand of industry to 
develop them and bring them into active use. Borne down by 
an Eastern governmental majority, cut off from all connection 
or sympathy with a people with whom we have no commercial 
ties, we have endured the disastrous results that must ever flow 
from an unnatural connection. Cut the knot! Cut it now; 
apply the knife! 

Mr. Stuart of Doddridge objected that under the prop- 
osition of Mr. Carlile the Committee on Division would 
be instructed to rej^ort a constitution and form of govern- 
ment. He held this body had no right or power to frame 
a constitution. That should emanate from the people who 
were to be governed by it. He was for referring this ques- 
tion to the j)eople, and if they voted for a division he was 
agreed to it. But he had not been sent here for the pur- 
pose of dividing the State of Virginia or of making a 
constitution for a new State. The thing had never been 
mooted before his people. The Committee on Division 
had the general subject under consideration, and he ob- 
jected to tying their hands by this special instruction. 
He moved to lay the resolutions on the table. The mo- 
tion prevailed by 38 to 32. 



THE AUGUST CONVENTION. 353 

DIVISION COMES FROM COMMITTEE. 

On the 10th inst., Mr. West from the Committee on 
Division reported an ordinance to provide for a division 
of the State. For this no less than eight substitutes were 
subsequently offered. These were made the order for the 
following Tuesday and each day till disposed of. 

A MONSTROUS BIRTH. 

The committee's ordinance which had now come before 
the Convention was one that could not possibly accomplish 
what the title proposed. Just who or what purpose shaped 
it cannot be precisely known, or whether it was the result 
of honest efPort to compromise and harmonize by an un- 
wieldy committee, made up in an incongruous way, with 
a large majority of material in it entirely incapable of 
a clear and connected plan. Mr. West proposed to take in 
all the northern part of Virginia clear across to the Poto- 
mac south of Washington, with nothing but an imaginary 
boundary between that territory and the rest of Virginia, 
and at the other end, to run a sort of snout or tail clear 
down to the Tennessee line. He provided that the Vir- 
ginia constitution, as modified by the ordinances of this 
Convention, should be adopted for the proposed State. He 
proposed to start his boundary on the Tennessee line so 
as to take in a part of Scott County, all of Russell ; thence 
to run along the top of Clinch mountain "to the county 
lines of Giles County; thence with the county lines of 
Giles and Tazewell to the county line of Mercer." This 
description seems to be faulty, as the maps show Bland 

Va.-23 



354 THE BENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

County intervening between Tazewell and Giles. The 
description of the lines, which is by mountain ranges in 
some places, is obscure and it is difficult to reconcile it 
with the maps ; but it appears to take in Highland, Pen- 
dleton, Hardy, Hampshire, Frederick, Loudon and Fair- 
fax, the line running to the Potomac south of Alexandria. 
One merit of the scheme urged by Mr. West was that it 
embraced the grave of Washington. He thought that 
would commend it to the favor of Congress when the new 
State knocked for admittance. But it seemed to the writer 
then, and does yet, that a Congress possessed of common 
sense and ordinary artistic susceptibilities would have 
been shocked by such a territorial monstrosity. As for 
the Pater Patriae, if he could have looked down and have 
seen the part of his country in which he had once been 
specially interested carved and disfigured in the way Mr. 
West proposed, he must have turned over in his coffin by 
way of protest. 

DEBATE ON DIVISION. 

In the afternoon session, Mr. Barnes of Marion spoke 
against any division of the State. There had been no 
popular uprising or demand for such a measure. Accord- 
ing to the spirit of the constitution, they ought to have 
the consent of the eastern as well as the western portion 
of the State, and that could not now be obtained. He 
doubted if Congress would admit a State on a merely tech- 
nical consent. He thought it better not to make the trial 
now and fail but to wait for the ripe fruit to fall into 
our hands. The time had not yet come for it. He had no 
objection to an expression on the subject, but was not 



THE AUGUST CONVENTIOlSr. 355 

willing the people should be distracted with such a ques- 
tion at this time. 

Mr. Martin of Wetzel asked if a division could not be 
had now, when could they obtain it ? 

Mr. Barnes replied: When the Seccessionists are 
driven out of the State. 

Mr. Martin said the Secessionists being in revolution 
against the United States had made themselves aliens and 
no longer citizens of either Virginia or the United States. 
Secession was unconstitutional. We have nothing to do 
with them, he said, as it regards our rights or interests 
in Western Virginia. For himself, he was for division 
even before the Richmond Convention was held, and his 
people had elected him on that issue. He was for a divi- 
sion not only on account of the recent wrongs but from 
long conviction. He spoke of the natural barriers and 
diversities dividing the West from the East. The people 
expected a division from this Convention and would be 
disappointed if the foundation for it were not laid. The 
people of Wetzel had instructed her members to go for im- 
iTiediate separation ; that this Convention should prepare 
the work so as to ask the consent of the Legislature which 
meets in December ; and having that, to apply to Congress 
for admission. As to embarrassing our friends in the 
East by this movement, nothing short of the- power of the 
United States could crush out secession in Eastern Vir- 
ginia. How could division in any way hamper the gov- 
ernment in that work? But after they had obtained the 
consent of the Legislature, it would still remain with 
Congress to refuse or delay admission if there were any 
apprehension of such embarrassment. 



356 THE BENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

Mr. Van Winkle moved to strike out "New Virginia" 
from the ordinance and substitute "Allegheny," and this 
was agreed to. 

Mr. Farns worth's substitute came up for considera- 
tion next morning. It started the line of division at the 
Kentucky line on the Tug Fork of Sandy River, where 
'Logan and Buchanan Counties join the river, and ran so 
as to include Logan, Wyoming, Raleigh, Fayette, !N^ich- 
olas, Webster, Randolph, Pendleton, Hardy, Hampshire^ 
Morgan, Berkeley and Jefferson. 

Mr. Boreman of Tyler offered by way of substitute a 
paper consisting of preamble and resolutions, taking the 
ground that it would be premature and unfair to those 
parts of the State not represented here io authorize the 
formation of a new State, and recommending that the 
Legislature, "providing the people within the proposed 
boundaries shall be freed from their present embarrass- 
ments and the state of affairs in the country will then 
admit of a full and free expression of the popular senti- 
ment," provide for taking a vote within the boundaries 
on the question of division on the first Thursday of Janu- 
ary ensuing. These resolutions had apparently been drawn 
by Mr. Van Winkle, who followed them with an elab- 
orate argument against any present attempt at division. 
He spoke two hours and the Intelligencer pronounced his 
speech "a masterly effort, cogent, logical and compre- 
hensive ; the very strongest that has yet been made, or we 
believe can be, against a division of the State." No 
synopsis of the speech Avas printed because it was the in- 
tention to print it in full and as a result of its great 



THE AUGUST CONVENTION. 3^^ 

length it was not printed at all. Mr. Van Winkle, how- 
ever, did not take ground against division per se, but 
against the expediency of it at that time. He was replied 
to by Mr. Crane, who, while a fervid orator, with the 
gift of real eloquence, could not put his arguments into 
the compact shape given his by Mr. Van Winkle. 

ATTORNEY GENERAL BATES LENDS A HAND. 

In the next day's session, Mr. Ritchie of Marion, 
spoke against division. He held that it would violate the 
spirit if not the letter of the constitution and cited the 
clause in reference to the formation of new States. The 
consent of the whole State must be had, not that of one- 
third or one-fourth ; it would embarrass the action of the 
general govei-nment in its efforts to put down the rebel- 
lion ; the slavery question must come up in the formation 
of the constitution, and this would create controversy in 
Congress and among our own people. The present State 
government, he said, would be abrogated and the people 
of a portion of the State left without any government. He 
desired a division of the State at the right time, but en- 
tered his protest against attempting it now. He pre- 
sented a letter from Hon. Edward Bates, Attorney Gen- 
eral of the United States, expressing the opinion that : 

The formation of a new State out of Western Virginia is 
an original act of revolution. I do not deny the power of revo- 
lution. I do not call it a right, for it is never prescribed; it 
exists in force only and has and can have no law but the will 
of the revolutionists. Any attempt to carry it out involves a 
plain breach of both the Constitutions of Virginia and of the 
Nation. And hence it is plain that you cannot take that course 



858 THE EENDIISTG OF VIRGINIA. 

without weakening if not destroying your claims upon the sym- 
pathy and support of the general government and without dis- 
concerting the plan adopted by Virginia and the general gov- 
ernment for the reorganization of the revolted States and the 
restoration of the integrity of the Union. 

This letter shows that when it was written Mr. Bates 
had not studied — at least had not understood — the ques- 
tion he disj)osed of in this summary way. Before the 
date of the letter, the executive branch of the United 
States government — whose legal adviser Mr. Bates was 
supposed to be — and likewise both houses of Congress, had 
recognized the procedure which furnished the basis for the 
formation of a new State as entirely within the require- 
ments of the Federal Constitution and of the State consti- 
tution. The Legislature had been recognized as the legis- 
lature competent to give its "consent," so that no "original 
act of revolution" was now possible. The later event 
proved that the United States, so far from being embar- 
rassed by the erection of West Virginia, was actually 
strengthened, for the military organization under the new 
State was stronger than before. The restored govern- 
ment was not "abrogated," as Mr. Eitchie had appre- 
hended, but removed to a part of Virginia beyond the 
lines of West Virginia when the authority of the latter was 
established. The plan of reconstruction which was pre- 
maturely disturbing Mr. Bates was not the present exi- 
gency he thought it. Only one great battle had been 
fought, and that had been disastrous to the Union arms. 
It was hardly time for the administration at Washing- 
ton, or for restored Virginia, to be laying plans for re- 
construction. When reconstruction came around five or 



THE AUGUST CONVENTION. 359 

six years later, even Mr. Bates could not have shown how 
West Virginia was in the way of it. Three months ear- 
lier, in a letter to John Minor Botts of Virginia, Mr. 
Bates had declared that if Virginia should "dismember 
the Nation, she herself would be dismembered." He re- 
peated this and to emphasize it said: ^'Now mark my 
prophecy: Unless Virginia by a rapid revolution redeem 
herself from the gulf that lies open just before her, she 
will be degraded, impoverished and dismembered." So 
she w^as. Mr. Bates was a better prophet than lawyer! 

SMITHES ''legal fiction." 

Fontaine Smith of Marion followed the reading of Mr. 
Bates' letter on the same side of the question. He began 
by showing the natural reasons demanding a separation, 
but contended there were insuperable difficulties at pres- 
ent. One was that the intention of the Constitution of 
the United States could not be complied with. The full 
consent of the State was necessary, and this could not now 
be obtained. The larger part of the State was in duress, 
and it would be wrong to take advantage of wdiat he de- 
scribed as ''a legal fiction" to obtain a division now in 
opposition to the wishes of the eastern part of the State, 
which w^as as much interested as the West and had an 
equal right to be heard. "Having now assumed to be the 
State of Virginia," he said, "we are, of course, responsible 
for the entire State debt." If they divided the State 
and abdicated all the government of Virginia, it would be 
running counter to the interest of those who held the State 
bonds and their opposition w^ould have to be encountered. 
His own position w^as taken boldly that a division could 



o60 THE EENDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

be obtained only by consent of all of Virginia, eastern 
and middle as well as western. * * * When the re- 
bellion should have been driven out of the rest of the State, 
the power of the government would be in the hands of a 
different class of men in that part of the State from 
what it was now — poor men, whose interests would be 
identical with our own, friendly to us, who, if we then de- 
sired it, would give their consent to a separation. He 
looked upon the question of slavery as a matter of climate 
and soil. Men would be governed by their interests. If 
the question were agitated now while the present party 
was in power, the application for admission would be re- 
jected. His plan was to adopt the present State consti- 
tution, with necessary modifications, and hold an election 
in October to get a popular expression. 

In the afternoon Mr. Paxton addressed the Conven- 
tion. He admitted nothing should be done which would 
really embarrass the government. It could not be denied 
that the greater part of the loyal people of Western Vir- 
ginia were represented here. They had long been op- 
pressed by the remainder of the State, and even their 
warning when the ordinance of secession was passed, that 
the people would not submit, was treated with contempt. 
Our best interests demand the separation. This being 
true, now that the constitutional difficulty had disap- 
peared, why not initiate steps for a division ? The only 
substantial objection was that it would embarrass the gov- 
ernment. He could not see how. They were now en- 
tirely dependent on the government and even if all other 
steps had been completed, they would avail nothing with- 
out the consent of Congress. The government thus held 



THE AUGUST CONVENTION. 361 

the final control ; and, therefore, how could the prelimi- 
nary steps embarrass it ? If the State was ever to be di- 
vided, it must be begun sometime, by somebody. It would 
not divide itself. He believed Congress would in good 
time sanction any proper division, and that the Convention 
ought not to adjourn without taking some step to meet the 
expectations of the people. 

Mr. Lewis of Harrison followed in a somewhat ramb- 
ling speech in favor of division. In the course of his re- 
marks he said this Convention had been convened for the 
express purpose of a division of the State, and he read 
letters from citizens of the interior urging some measures 
looking to that end — one from Hon. Wm. G. Brown, who 
told him now was the time. 

Mr, Smith of Marion offering to read a letter from 
Attorney General Bates, was reminded that the letter had 
already been read. Mr. Carlile remarked that there was 
"another letter from Mr. Bates now in the possession of 
the Secretary in which he took very different grounds 
from those taken in the letter read ;" and if the Attorney 
General was to be dragged in here to influence the action 
of the Convention, he should insist on having him "pre- 
sented in both phases." Mr. Bates might be good author- 
ity "but he was not their constituents." 

GOVERNOE POLSLEY SEES A NEW LIGHT. 

The succeeding morning. Governor Polsley spoke 
against division. He argued the specific object for which 
this body had assembled, as shown in the second address 
issued by the Central Committee, was the reorganization 



362 THE RENDING OF VIEGINIA. 

of the State govertiment. Not only so, but such was the 
understanding and such substantially our own declaration 
in the June session, having then unanimously declared 
that it was imprudent and inexpedient to undertake a divi- 
sion of the State. They should limit themselves to their 
legitimate powers. They would be even more despotic 
than the Richmond Convention if they proceeded now to 
effect a division before a free expression of opinion could 
bo had. It was impossible for even one-fourth of the coun- 
ties included in the boundaries to give an expression upon 
the proposition. He desired earnestly that this common- 
wealth might be divided as early as possible, but he feared 
a false step now would defeat that object. As for the dan- 
ger in the event of a compromise with the rebellion, he 
had never permitted himself to believe such a result pos- 
sible. 

Mr. Hubbard of Ohio followed Mr. Polsley and con- 
curred in his contention that this Convention was not 
inaugurated for the purpose of dividing the State, but 
for the reorganization of a government for the whole State 
and the support of the general government in putting down 
the rebellion. He referred to the tabling by a vote of 50 
to 17 of Mr. Farnsworth's resolution to declare that the 
object in reorganizing the State government was to obtain 
a division of the State. His objection to action now in 
the direction of division was that it would embarrass the 
government in putting doAvn the rebellion. If the regular 
State government nov\'' in operation were destroyed, liow 
could the remainder of the State ever be restored to the 
Union ? The President of the United States had said 



THE AUGUST CONVENTION. 363 

this movement here was worth more to the government 
than an army with banners. 

Mr. Carlile said if he conld be convinced that the ac- 
tion they proposed wonld embarrass the Federal govern- 
ment in the slightest degree in its efforts to maintain the 
Union, he wonld join in voting the proposition down. But 
how embarrass ? Did the Ohio River which divides ns 
from Ohio embarrass the administration ? The idea that 
imaginary lines defining the boundaries, of States crushes 
the power of the government to maintain and protect it- 
self was baseless. We cannot ourselves divide the State. 
We simply propose that the people within a certain boun- 
dary may be permitted to declare their wishes on the sub- 
ject. How will this embarrass the government in its mili- 
tary operations ? Would some gentleman be kind enough 
to point out how ? 

Mr. Hubbard asked how was Eastern Virginia to be 
restored to the Union if the State were divided ? 

"Who" asked Mr. Carlile, "restored Northwestern Virginia 
to the Union? The loyal people of Northwestern Virginia. The 
loyal people of Eastern Virginia will have to restore the East. 
That is the way every seceded State in the Union is to be 
restored. But the passage of this proposition will not defeat 
that object, nor render us less powerful than now. Nor do I 
expect we will have here assembled representatives from all 
Virginia. Does the gentleman from Mason think if we wait 
until there is a full representation here from every county in 
the State a separation will ever be obtained? As to the unkind- 
ness of taking advantage of our eastern brethren, how much 
they consulted our interests in what they have been doing! It 
was well understood Mr. Farnsworth's resolution was tabled 
because the time for a manifesto was especially inopportune. 
The Legislature had not met, had not elected senators, and the 



864 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

senators had not been admitted. In a word, we had no Legisla- 
ture at that time qualified to give the requisite consent. I my- 
self opposed the resolution and said that as soon as could be after 
we had such a Legislature, I would be foremost among those 
who sought the division of the State. Interest is the base of all 
political action, and if we believe our interest requires this 
separation, we are justified in the eyes of the world. As 
to the matter of embarrassing the government, it could not 
possibly do so up to the point of our application to Congress. 
Then the decision of that very question will rest with Congress, 
and they may admit us or ask us to wait for a more auspicious 
time. 

Mr. Carlile added that their action in that direction 
could not affect the government at Wheeling. 

Mr. Van Winkle remarked that they "v/ould bring it 
into eonteiopt." 

"Sir," replied Mr. Carlile, "jou cannot bring a gov- 
ernment into contempt while my friend from Wood is a 
nicmber of it." 

Touching the financial aspects of the question, Mr. 
Carlile said that whenever a settlement should be made 
between this portion of the State and the residue and a 
correct balance struck, it would be in our favor. 

Mr. Smith of Marion asked how the settlement was to 
be made ? 

"That, sir," replied Mr. Carlile, "is to be left to your- 
self and other eminent gentlemen in the future legislative 
assemblies of Virginia to determine." 

There was no reason in morals or in law, Mr. Carlile 
argued, why we should not avail ourselves of this oppor- 
tunity. There had never been a time before in his judg- 
ment when it could have been accomplished peacefully, 
legally, constitutionally. So far from embarrassing the 



THE AUGUST CONVENTION. 365 

operations of the government, it would in a military way 
strengthen its hands. With a separate existence they 
could give the government a better support than now, 
embarrassed as they were at every step by the innumerable 
burdens weighing upon them so long as they remained a 
part of Virginia. As representatives professing obedi- 
ence to the will of their people, it was as little as they 
could do to give them an opportunity to be heard at the 
ballot-box on this subject. That was all that was proposed, 
all they would be pledged to by any action taken here. 

Mr. Stuart of Doddridge wanted it distinctly under- 
stood that he was in favor of a division of the State, and 
he had believed and urged it should take place at the time 
of the constitutional convention of 1850-51. 

But, he said, we are here reorganizing our government 
interests. Evetything sinks into insignificance in com- 
parison with maintaining the Union. If action here was 
likely to endanger the cause of the Union, they should 
hesitate. He quoted the constitutional provision in re- 
gard to the formation of new States. It was contrary to 
all ideas of justice to suppose it meant that two-thirds of 
a State could cut loose from the rest by an arbitrary ma- 
jority. If two-thirds could not, how could one-fourth 
force a division without the consent of the remainder ? 

FAENSWOKTII IN LINE AGAIN. 

Mr. Farnsworth followed. He charged upon a por- 
tion of those opposing immediate action that they were 
opposed to the formation of a new State altogether. Two 
of the members had told him they were, and they were 



366 THE BENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

found acting with the gentlemen who professed to be in 
favor of division but were now opposing what they were 
pleased to call precipitate action. The argument of the 
gentleman from Wood was that one of the great objects 
was to get into position to legally and constitutionally 
take these steps. If they were not in such position now, 
they never would be. He recapitulated the different steps 
that had been taken to make this a legitimate government. 
They were not to be prejudiced, he claimed, by the rebel- 
lion in Eastern Virginia. They were not responsible for 
that; and they were not to suffer because the rebels there 
had done wrong. He took the ground that the govern- 
ment could not refuse them admission as a new State if 
the application were properly made. It was a right they 
had under their State constitution and under the Consti- 
tution of the United States, with assent of their legis- 
lature, to demand admission. The argument that if they 
should be formed into a new State they could not be loyal 
to the United States was the weakest he had ever heard ; 
and if the success of the general government depended 
on denying the rights of the people of Western Virginia, 
then its success hung on a very brittle thread. Bvit the gov- 
ernment was high above such a position. She was contimd- 
ing for Constitutional liberty and we with her contend- 
ing for the same. It was taking no advantage of the East. 
They had refused to join us, and should we suffer be- 
cause of their refusal ? There was a settlement to be 
made with Eastern Virginia, but the separation would not 
aggravate the case in the least. As to the boundary, he 
would like to have the line run with the mountains, but 
at this time perhaps that boundary could not be had. 



THE AUGUST CONVENTION. 367 

Only give us a State composed of such counties as named 
in his proposition and it would vie with any other State 
in the Union. He was opposed to taking in any counties 
at this time that would have to be coerced into measures. 

ME. LAMB IS AGAINST IT. 

Mr. Lamb followed at some length. He declared at 
the outset that he was "for a separation of this State 
when it can be done at the proper time and in a proper 
manner." He would like to have the line of the Blue 
Ridge if it was to be had; if not, the line of the Alle- 
ghenies as far south at least as the Kanawha. He thought 
it essential we should have a boundary capable of military 
defense to make our position a respectable one in the 
family of States. He recited what the west had suffered 
from the misrule of the east, and added that our social 
habits were different and our commercial relations were 
not with them. Every consideration which could be ad- 
dressed to the wisdom of a statesman demands a separa- 
tion; but it should be when we can command a suitable 
boundary and when a full and free expression of opinion 
can be had throughout the limits of the new State. These 
conditions could not be complied with now; and in the 
heat with which members now pressed the measure, he 
saw nothing but what presaged misfortune for Northwest- 
ern Virginia. It was not sixty days since the present 
government was inaugurated, and they were already seek- 
ing to overthrow all that had been then done. This dis- 
position to be continually changing great fundamental 
institutions could lead to nothing but misfortune. They 



o68 THE KEXDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

were proceeding more rapidly than the zealots of the 
French revolution. Why this haste ? They were no longer 
subject to the control of the East, though in tw^o ways they 
might again become so. One was in event the United 
States should be unable to maintain itself and defend 
them. The other in case the territory of the State was 
repossessed by the Union arms and resumed its place un- 
der this restored government. But there would be plenty 
of opportunities to bring up the question of separation 
before all Eastern Virginia was represented. The prog- 
ress of the armies would be gradual; they would be able 
to foresee when the East w^ould come in and act accord- 
ingly. 

But suppose, he said, a new State were formed within the 
boundaries proposed? As a matter of course the present gov- 
ernment, which has been acknowledged by the Executive of the 
United States and by Congress is superceded; because from the 
time this Convention announces that another government is to 
be formed, who will obey or regard the present government? 
Then if the armies of the United States are to succeed in East- 
ern Virginia, to carry out the plan of the administration a new 
State government is to be formed there. As Secessionism is 
put down in district after district of the State, the counties of 
Eastern Virginia are to be furnished again with a constitutional 
nucleus. This restored government is out of the way. "What 
sort of a government will be formed in the east? Necssarily a 
government to represent the State of Virginia. Your new State 
will yet be antagonized. Neither Congress nor the Executive 
can act in reference to it; for carrying out the great plan in 
bringing back the State of Virginia into the Union, they must, 
as expressed in the letter of the Attorney-General, have "a con- 
stitutional nucleus" around which the shattered elements of the 
Union throughout the State can rally. Another State govern- 
ment for the east would then be a necessary result. As the 
arms of the United States prevail, this government will extend 



THE AUGUST CONVENTION. 8()9 

itself over the whole east. It will be a government which the 
United States will recognize, and will be the legal government 
of the State of Virginia. Then you have superceded your old 
government, which the United States has recognized as the legal 
government of the State, and your new (State) government 
has no such claims, for it is nothing in fact or in law until 
recognized by the Government of the United States. What re- 
spect will the new government in the eastern part of the State 
then pay to your ordinances or to the lines marked out for a 
new State? The State of Virginia will have again that very 
control over you of which you have so much and so justly 
complained. I see in the measure which you propose to us quite 
as much cause for apprehension that Eastern Virginia may again 
extend her dominion over us. 

This argument lacks Mr. Lamb's characteristic sound- 
ness and sasjacitv. The mistaken assumption that the 
restored State government woukl go out of existence when 
the new State eame in leads him into a maze of weakness 
and confusion quite foreign to Mr. Lamb's usual strength 
and correctness. Mr. Ritchie fell into the same error, 
that the restored government would be ''abrogated." So 
far from it, that would be impossible ; having the official 
recognition of the Executive and both houses of Congress, 
and the action of Congress being conclusive that it thereby 
became the legal, legitimate, constitutional government of 
the State, with senators and rejDresentatives in Congress, 
it had become a political impossibility for it to be "abro- 
gated." If there should not be a foot of territory over 
which the restored government could assert its authority 
till recovered by arms, it must none the less remain a 
political entity so long as the Federal government con- 
tinued, representing loyal Virginia then wholly in duress. 

Va.-24 



370 THE REXDING OF VIRGINIA. 

The United States could not recognize another govern- 
ment in place of it. If confutation were necessary we 
have it in the event. Governor Peirpoint's authority did 
not cease — was not impaired in the least — when the new 
State came in save as to the territory thus withdrawn from 
his jurisdiction. The restored government remained un- 
diminished over the remainder of the Commonwealth. 
Governor Peirpoint removed the archives to Alexandria, 
and two years later, when the duress had been removed by 
Appomattox, the restored government was established as 
the rightful government of Virginia in the ancient capital 
on the James. 

GOVERNMENT NOT "PROVISIONAL." 

In answer to some objections that had been made by 
Mr. Lewis of Harrison to the manner of organizing what 
he referred to as a "provisional government," Mr. Lamb 
took some pains to explain that the restored government 
was not a provisional goveriiment. 

When this Convention met in .June, said Mr. Lamb, it was 
impossible to have througliout the counties of Northwestern 
Virginia an election for Governor. The Convention from im- 
perative necessity were obliged to assume the responsibility of 
electing a Governor themselves. That far we interfered with 
the rights of popular sovereignty; but we trusted to our con- 
stituents to excuse us for that interference on account of the 
necessities, the difficulties, the vast embarrassments with which 
we were surrounded. They unanimously approved of our 
course. Throughout the whole length and breadth of this land, 
our action in June has been approved — approved by the Gov- 
ernment of the United States, approved by the loyal men of the 
loyal States everywhere. We were fully justified in doing it. 
But having elected a Governor in this irregular and — except 
so far as it was justified by the circumstances — unjustifiable 



THE AUGUST COXVENTIOISr. 371 

mode, we prescribed six months for his term of office. Yet we 
went on here to enact as follows: The General Assembly to 
provide by law for the election of Governor and Lieutenant- 
Governor by the people as soon as in their judgment such elec- 
tion could be properly held. The office of Governor under the 
reorganized government was not to terminate at the end of six 
months, at least according to the ordinance for the reorganiza- 
tion of that government. An express provision is made for its 
continuance in a regular manner by popular election when the 
Legislature think such an election can be held. The Convention 
did not recommend this to the Legislature. They required it. 
The provision in regard to members of the Legislature is that 
"they shall hold their offices from the passage of this ordinance 
until the end of the terms for which they were respectively 
elected." The members of the House of Delegates under this 
system hold until 1863 and a portion of the senators until 1865. 
"When the terms of those officers expire, if this system is to be 
continued, their successors will be elected in the regular way. 
In no proper sense of the term, therefore, is this merely a "pro- 
visional government," for a provisional government, I take it, 
is a government which fixes in the very charter of its creation 
a period beyond which it is not to continue. 

Mr. Lamb recited the facts to show that the call for 
this Convention had been addressed to the whole State. 
In concluding his remarks he said : 

I fear if you press this measure upon us, as you seem de- 
termined, that its only result will be woe to you and me and 
mine; but if the measure carries, I shall join heartily, fairly and 
honestly in carrying out your determination. My fate will be 
yours; and I can only hope that whether weal or woe come of it, 
I may still be able in any event to protect those who are 
dependent on me. 

A FAMILY JAR, 

The next day (Saturday), the 17th, was spent over the 
several substitutes for the committee's ordinance. Mr. 
Carlile offered, in the way of compromise as he said, to 



872 THE KEXDIXC; OF VIKGIXIA. 

embrace only the territory 2:troposed in Mr. Farnsworth's 
substitute and then make it the duty of the Legislature 
at its next session to provide for submitting the question 
of division at an early day to the territory so embraced. 
Late in the day, Mr. Stuart of Doddridge moved, as an 
amendment to ]\[r. Carlile's proposition, to substitute the 
territory included by the committee's original ordinance 
— from the Tennessee line to the tomb of Washington. 
In the discussion of this, Mr. Carlile, having exhausted 
his privilege, rose to speak when several members objected. 
Mr. Carlile became emphatic and said, amid great confu- 
sion, that if after the offer he had made to meet the other 
side on a compromise this course were to be pursued by 
them, he would take it all back, and if they "would and 
must have war," they should have it. Some member cried : 
"And war it shall be !" Another: "We will meet you !" 

The vote on Stuart's amendment was taken, and it was 
carried by one majority. 

Mr. Farnsworth remarked that they now had "no fur- 
ther business here," and he moved to adjourn sine die. 
Several members cried : "Yes, let us adjourn and go 
home !" 

The sine die motion was not seconded, and the Con- 
vention adjourned in disorder. 

KECONCILIATION AND PEOGKESS. 

Monday morning the Convention came together in 
calmer temper. Mr. Hooton of Preston brought forward 
a proposition to appoint a committee of six, with instruc- 
tions to bring in a measure on the subject of division that 



THE AUGUST CONVENTION. 



373 




Daniel D. T. Fabnswoeth. 

should, if possible, harmonize the conflicting views of the 
Convention. This proposition was the beginning of wis- 
dom. It was agreed to ; and later in the day a committee, 
representing both sides about equally, was appointed as 
follows : Farnsworth, Carlile, Paxton, Van Winkle, Ruff- 
ner and Lamb. This was a wieldy and excellent commit- 
tee, capable of preparing a measure which would be work- 
able in details. 



THE COMMITTEE REPORTS. 



Next morning Mr. Farnsworth, chairman of the com- 
mittee, brought in "An Ordinance to provide for the form- 
ation of a new State out of a portion of the territory of 



374 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

this State." The first section included imconditionally 
the counties of Logan, Wyoming, Raleigh, Fajette, Xicho- 
las, Webster, Randolph, Tucker, Preston, Monongalia, 
Marion, Taylor, Barbour, Upshur, Harrison, Lewis, Brax- 
ton, Clay, Kanawha, Boone, Wayne, Cabell, Putnam, 
Mason, Jackson, Roane, Calhoun, Wirt, Gilmer, Ritchie, 
Wood, Pleasants, Tyler, Doddridge, Wetzel, Marshall, 
Ohio, Brooke and Hancock (39) ; and provided that the 
State should be called ''Kanawha," It provided for an 
election within these boundaries on the question of di- 
vision, to be held October 24th, delegates to be chosen 
at the same time to frame a constitution if division should 
carry. At the same date the people in Greenbrier, Poca- 
hontas, Hardy, Hampshire, Morgan, Berkeley and Jeffer- 
son were to be allowed to vote for or against being in- 
cluded ; and if their vote should be for, the constitutional 
convention was authorized to so alter the boundaries as to 
include these counties. 

It was apparent that the ordinance had been drawn 
by Mr. Lamb or Mr. Van Winkle, or between them. The 
careful and systematic arrangement of its provisions 
showed their hand. While both were against such action 
at the time, evidently both had deemed it best to give the 
Divisionists a fair opportunity to submit their question 
to the people. Mr. Van Winkle was in some degree won 
over by an agreement for a constitutional convention ; and 
the name "Kanawha" was a concession to him as well as 
to Mr. Ruffner. Mr, Lamb having put his hand to the 
plow, did his best to jDrepare a measure capable of being"^ 
carried out. Without the co-operation of Lamb and Van 
Winkle, it is more than doubtful if any in the Convention 



THE AUGUST CONVENTION. 375 

could have prepared an ordinance which would have ac- 
complished — at least without a good deal of friction — what 
the new State men sought. It had been demonstrated 
that, with all his talents, Mr. Carlile was not the man 
to do it. 

VAN WINKLE SUPPORTS. 

After the reading of the ordinance, Mr. Van Winkle 
remarked that the questions involved were those of time 
and boundary. They had conceded, he said, to the gen- 
tlemen on the other side an opportunity of bringing this 
matter before the Legislature at its next session in consid- 
eration, in part, of the fact that if the Legislature should 
hold only its regular session it would not meet again until 
two years after December next. lie considered that some 
concessions had been made to his side of the question in 
providing for a convention to frame a constitution. There 
were serious objections to going on with the old consti- 
tution and organizing a new State under its provisions 
and in a few months having to make another constitution. 
The constitution to be framed by the Convention would be 
submitted to the people. In reference to the boundary, 
he had been strongly disposed to include the Valley, but 
had somewhat changed his opinion. One ground for the 
change was that it would be taking too much from the old 
State; another that the Valley itself "would not consent — 
at least no other part of the Valley than the counties pro- 
vided for in the ordinance. The ordinance had been made 
up from the diiferent propositions offered and was the 
result of a sincere desire on the part of the committee to 
present something which would meet the approbation of 



376 



THE EENDING OF VIRGINIA. 



the Convention and the people generally. The great con- 
cession on his side was in conceding early action, to refuse 
which would perhaps have been fatal to the whole thing. 

POLSLEY AGAINST. 

Mr. Polslej opposed the committee's report. His real 
objection was that the Convention had no power to act 
on this subject; that "although we are de jure — we are, 
in fact, the rightful government of the whole State of Vir- 
ginia, according to the principles of American government 
and according to the principles recognized bj the govern- 
ment of the United States — jet we are not de facto the 
government of *the whole State of Virginia." For this 
reason he could not feel they had any right to adopt meas- 
ures for a separation of the State. Mr. Polsley, it may 
be recalled, was one of those who. in the May Convention, 
were ready for the most radical measures. He was in full 
sympathy with Mr. Carlile in his wish to effect an imme- 
diate separation, and was not frightened when told by Mr. 
Willey that such a course would be "triple treason.'' Now 
he had swung around to the other extreme. 

MR. LAMB COMES AROUND. 

Mr. Lamb supported the committee's report. He would 
remind his friends that by the Constitution of the United 
States no action of the people of Virginia could effect any- 
thing without the consent of the Legislature towards the 
formation of a new State, and that consent must be free 
and untrammeled. This was one security against division. 
Another was that another convention was to be held to 



THE AUGUST CONVENTION. 377 

prepare and submit a constitution to the people of the new 
State. If thai convention shoukl find the state of things 
would not allow the subject to be fairly and freely acted 
upon, they certainly would postpone the matter until such 
expression could be had. He thought they had a reason- 
able security that no action would be had unless an actual 
and fair expression of popular sentiment should be pre- 
viously secured. 

Mr. Tarr proposed to amend the ordinance so as to 
include Hampshire, Hardy^ Morgan, Berkeley and Jeffer- 
son without conditions. Mr. Stuart of Doddridge moved 
to include also Pendleton and Highland. Mr. Burdett 
remarked that some idea of the strength of the Union senti- 
ment in Highland could be formed from the fact that the 
first troops to invade Northwestern Virginia were from 
Highland County. They had been quartered in his town 
and in his own house. Among them was one Captain 
Hull, who in the Richmond Convention had been a Union 
man, but who had finally yielded to the pressure. 

A QUESTION OF TRANSPOKTATION. 

Mr. Stuart inquired if there had not been a company 
of Secession troops in Taylor County before these came in 
from Highland ? 

Mr. Burdett replied that might be true; but he had 
only alluded to the fact to show how strong was the Union 
sentiment in Highland. He supposed the gentleman from 
Doddridge had perhaps some relatives over there, and he 
"believed it would be cheaper for him to go over to them 
than to try to bring the country to us." 



378 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

Mr. Stuart's amendment was lost, and Mr. Tarr's mo- 
tion agreed to by 35 to 27. 

THE FAT IN THE FIRE. 

Mr. Carlile took the floor and said that by the action 
just taken the ordinance had been destroyed. The pro- 
vision in the ordinance was to allow these counties to 
come in if they desired, not to force them in against their 
wish. One object was to get rid of the Secession forces. 
He believed Eastern Virginia was willing to let North- 
western Virginia go and form a separate State ; but -would 
they be willing without a fierce struggle to let go these 
counties containing some eight thousand slaves and which 
were within their natural boundaries ? There was no 
assurance that these counties want to come to us at all. 
As to w^anting them because the Baltimore & Ohio Rail- 
road runs through them, in times of peace we have free 
and unmolested use of the road and in times of war it 
depended on who had military possession of it. 

Mr. Caldwell of Marshall, interrupting, moved a re- 
consideration of the vote adopting Mr. Tarr's motion. 

Mr. Xichols followed in an appeal to members not to 
again throw the element of discord into the Convention 
by mutilating the compromise work of the committee. 
They all knew he had opposed immediate action ; but the 
committee had harmonized on a measure, and members 
should not captiously oj)pose the results attained by the 
committee, distract the Convention and ruin everything. 

Mr. Ilall of Marion occupied some time in vindicat- 
ing the Union sentiment of Richmond and Eastern Vir- 
ginia. He favored taking in the counties included by 



THE AUGUST CONVENTIOlSr. 379 

Mr. Tarr's amendment. He was opposed to being in a 
hurry. They should not hasten too much towards a divi- 
sion of the State. 

Mr. Van Winkle remarked that if those counties were 
left as the committee had proposed them, they could vote 
themselves in if they chose ; but if a county should so vote 
while an intervening county voted the other way, of 
course it could not come in. The leaving out of these 
counties and others from the absolute boundary and thus 
making provision whereby they might come in if thej 
wished, had been the very essence of the compromise which, 
had been effected. 

ALL SAFE AGAIN. DIVISION VOTED. 

Mr. Caldwell's motion to reconsider prevailed by a 
vote of 43 to 27 ; and in the afternoon Mr. Tarr's motion 
was lost by a vote of 31 to 48. 

Mr. Burley moved to include without conditions 
Hardy, Hampshire and Morgan, but the motion was lost. 

Mr. Smith of Marion opposed the report of the com- 
mittee, on the ground that it would bring up prominently 
the question of slavery — "which must result most disas- 
trously." 

Mr. Stuart of Doddridge moved to strike out "Kana- 
wdia" as the name of the State and substitute "West Vir- 
ginia." The motion was rejected without discussion. 

The ordinance was then put u]Don its passage and 
adopted by the following vote : 

Yeas — Berkshire, Brown, Burdett, Brumfield, Gather, Craw- 
ford, Carlile, Crane of Preston, Crane of Randolph, Caldwell, 
Copley, Davidson, Douglas, Downey, Davis, Evans, Ferrell, 



380 THE KENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

Farnsworth, Foley, Fast, Fleming, Hale, Hagans, Howard, Jack- 
son, Kramer, Lamb, Lewis, Love, Martin of Wetzel, Meyers, 
Price, Paxton, Parsons, Ruffner, Smith of Marion, Slack, Smith 
of Pleasants, Scott, Smith of Upshur, Swan, Taft, Vance, Van 
Winkle, West, Withers, Williamson, Wilson, Zinn -50. 

Nays — Boreman (President), Atkinson, Boreman of Tyler, 
Barnes, Bowyer, Burley, Broski, Crothers, Close, Carskadon, Gist, 
Graham, Harrison, Hubbard, Hall of Marion, Hawxhurst, John- 
son, Koonce, Mason, Montague, Nichols, Polsley, Ritchie, Stuart, 
Tarr, Trout, Wetzel, Watson— 28. 

Following are the first three sections of the ordinance 
as adopted: 

DIVISION ORDINANCE. 

Whereas, It is represented to be the desire of the people 
inhabiting the counties hereinafter mentioned to be separated 
from this Commonwealth and to be erected into a separate State 
and admitted into the Union of States and become a member of 
the Government of the United States: 

The people of Virginia, by their delegates assembled in Con- 
vention at Wheeling, do ordain that a new State, to be called 
the State of Kanawha, be formed and erected out of the territory 
included within the following described boundary: Beginning 
on the Tug Fork of Sandy River, on the Kentucky line where 
the counties of Buchanan and Logan join the same, and running 
thence with the dividing lines of said counties and the dividing 
line of these counties and McDowell to the Mercer County line, 
and with the dividing line of the counties of Mercer and Wyom- 
ing to the Raleigh county line; thence with the dividing line of 
the counties of Raleigh and Mercer, Monroe and Raleigh, Green- 
brier and Raleigh, Fayette and Greenbrier, Nicholas and Green- 
brier, Webster, Greenbrier and Pocahontas, Randolph and Poca- 
hontas, Randolph and Pendleton, to the southwest corner of 
Hardy County; thence with the dividing line of the counties of 
Hardy and Tucker, to the Fairfax Stone; thence with the line 
dividing the States of Maryland and Virginia, to the Pennsyl- 
vania line; thence with the line dividing the States of Penn- 
sylvania and Virginia, to the Ohio River; thence down said 
river, and including the same, to the dividing line between Vir- 



THE AUGUST CONVENTION. 381 

glnia and Kentucky, and with the said line to the beginning: 
including within the boundaries of the proposed new State the 
counties of Logan, Wyoming. Raleigh, Fayette, Nicholas, Web- 
ster, Randolph, Tucker, Preston, Monongalia, Marion, Taylor, 
Barbour, Upshur, Harrison, Lewis, Braxton, Clay, Kanawha, 
Boone, W^ayne, Cabell, Putnam, Mason, Jackson, Roane, Cal- 
houn, Wirt, Gilmer, Ritchie, Wood, Pleasants, Tyler, Doddridge, 
Wetzel, Marshall, Ohio, Brooke and Hancock. 

2. All persons qualified to vote within the boundaries afore- 
said, and who shall present themselves at the several places of 
voting within their respective counties on the fourth Thursday 
in October next, shall be allowed to vote on the question of the 
formation of a new State as hereinbefore proposed; and it shall 
be the duty of the commissioners conducting the election at the 
said several places of voting, at the same time, to cause polls to 
be taken for the election of delegates to a convention to form a 
constitution for the government of the proposed State. 

3. The Convention hereinbefore provided for may change 
the boundaries described in the first section of this ordinance 
so as to include within the proposed State the counties of Green- 
brier and Pocahontas, or either of them, and also the counties of 
Hampshire, Hardy, Morgan, Berkeley and Jefferson, or either of 
them, and also such other counties as lie contiguous to the said 
boundaries or to the counties named in this section, if the coun- 
ties to be added, or either of them, by a majority of the votes 
given shall declare their wish to form part of the proposed 
State, and shall elect delegates to the said convention at elec- 
tions to be held at the time and in the manner herein provided 
for. 

Sections 4 and 5 provided the detail for holding and 
certifying the election ; Section 6 for the proclamation of 
the result by the Governor and calling together the con- 
stitutional convention on the 26th of November, in event 
division should have carried. Section 7 prescribed the 
representation in such Convention ; and Section 8 required 
the Governor to lay before the General Assembly at its 
next meeting the result of the election, "for their consent 



382 THE eejStding of vieginia. 

accordiug to tlie Constitution of the United States, if it 
shall be found that a majority of the votes cast be in favor 
of a new State and also in favor of the constitution pro- 
posed to said voters for their adoption." 

The 9th section, relating to the Virginia debt, con- 
taining also a clause to protect non-resident owners of land 
against tax discrimination, was as follows : 

9. The new State shall take upon itself a just proportion of 
the public debt of the Commonwealth of Virginia prior to the 
first day of January, 1861. to be ascertained by charging to it all 
State expenditures within the limits thereof, and a just propor- 
tion of the ordinary expenses of the State government since any 
part of said debt was contracted; and deducting therefrom the 
monies paid into the treasury of the Commonwealth from the 
counties included within the said new State during the same 
period. All private rights and interests in lands within the 
proposed State derived from the laws of Virginia prior to such 
separation shall remain valid and secure under the laws of the 
proposed State and shall be determined by the laws now exist- 
ing in the State of Virginia. The lands within the proposed 
State of non-resident proprietors shall not in any case be taxed 
higher than the lands of residents therein. No grants of lands 
or land warrants issued by the proposed State shall interfere 
with any warrant issued from the land office of Virginia prior to 
the 17th day of April last, which shall be located on lands 
within the proposed State now liable thereto. 

Section 10 provided for certifying to Congress con- 
sent when given; and the 11th and last, that the authority 
of the Reorganized State should remain unimpaired over 
the boundaries of the new until the latter had been fully 
admitted. 

The adoption of this ordinance completed the most im- 
portant work of the Convention. Ordinances were adopt- 
ed "ascertaining and declaring in what cases offices are 



THE AUGUST CO]!fVENTION. 383 

vacated under the declaration of June 17, 1861 ;" "provid- 
ing for the appointment of collectors of the public revenue 
in certain cases;" "providing for the election of repre- 
sentatives in the Congress of the United States;" "in- 
creasing the compensation of the Adjutant General dur- 
ing the continuance of hostilities." 

Resolutions offered by Mr, Van Winkle were adopted 
urging upon their fellow-citizens "the importance of ex- 
tending to the reorganized government a cordial recogni- 
tion and support in its efforts to establish civil author- 
ity and to cause the law to be administered and maintain 
peace and good order throughout its jurisdiction ;" also the 
duty of "encouraging by their countenance active co-opera- 
tion in the enrollment and drilling of at least one com- 
pany of State volunteers in every county for the purpose 
of suppressing rebellion and insurrection and aiding the 
civil authorities in the enforcement of the laws." 

The adjournment of the Convention was "until called 
together by the President of this Convention or the Gov- 
ernor ; and if not so convened on or before the first Thurs- 
day of January next," it should stand adjourned sine die. 

PRESIDENT BOKEMAN SUBMITS, 

Before announcing the final adjournment, President 
Boreman said : 

You have taken the initiative in the creation and organiza- 
tion of a new State. This is a step of vital importance. I hope 
and pray God it may be successful; that it may not engender 
strife in our midst nor bring upon us difficulties from abroad; 
but that its most ardent advocates may realize their fondest 
hopes of its complete success. So far as I am personally con- 
cerned, I bow with submission to what you have done on this 
subject. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

PART PLAYED BY THE "FOURTH ESTATE." 
—DIVISION VOTED. 

THE FKIEND OF DIVISION. 

Concerning the ordinance for division, the morning 
after the adjournment of the Convention the Intelligencer 
said: 

"The measure is not quite all the more ardent Division- 
ists would have preferred ; but if we are not greatly mis- 
taken in the temper of the people and in what will be the 
expression of it in the election to be held, we shall all be 
citizens of the State of Kanawha before many months roll 
around." 

The position of the Wheeling Intelligencer at this 
time in Western Virginia was at once unique and influ- 
ential. It was at that time in every essential the leading 
newspaper in the western half of the State, i^o dailies 
were then printed in the West except at Wheeling and 
Parkersburg. From the time A. W. Campbell came into 
the editorial control of the Intelligencer in 1856, the paper 
had been strongly, though conservatively, free-soil ; and as 
the issue of secession developed, it had grown correspond- 
ingly more emphatic in its unqualified support of the Fed- 
eral government and its denunciation of secession. 

3-4 



THE WORK OF A :!^EW«PAPER. 385 

THE ORGAN OF SECESSION. 

The opposition paper at the opening of the rebellion, 
the Wheeling Union, was owned by Henry Moore, a 
wealthy man with his chief interests in Baltimore, a 
Roman Catholic in religion and a Southern Democrat in 
politics, who had started the Union as a venture for his 
son Philip Henry, who, as the national issue developed, 
took the Disunion side of it ; and in the Spring of 1861, 
as we have seen, kept the John Tyler dictum standing at 
thd head of his editorial columns. 

THE INTELLIGENCER A POWER. 

The Intelligencer, by its editorial ability, its elevated 
tone, its unflinching Unionism and its anti-slavery atti- 
tude, had at the opening of the rebellion taken high rank 
not alone in Western Virginia but among its contempo- 
raries outside. When the question of a separation from 
Virginia began to be agitated, it was one of the first to 
take it up and soon became conspicuously and effectively 
the organ of division ; and probably wrought more power- 
fully than any single agency towards the result finally 
achieved ; and it took the ground and maintained it, with- 
out apology, that the elimination of slavery was a vital 
and necessary part of the task. 

The foregoing statement is not only a proper part of 
this history, but explains why such frequent quotation in 
these pages is made from the columns of the Intelligencer, 
in connection with the movements we are following. That 
newspaper was through this period the organ and em- 
bodiment of Union and new State opinion, the medium 

Va.-25 



386 THE KENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

employed by the friends of these movements in all parts of 
Western Virginia, and always a faithful exponent of their 
views and promoter of their purpose. It thus became the 
center around which the new State and free-State elements 
rallied and was looked to as not only faithful but authori- 
tative. Two years before his death, Governor Peirpoint, 
reviewing the times with which this volume deals and his 
connection with them, said : "What would we have done 
without the Intelligencer in those days? I felt then and 
feel now, that it was the right arm of our movement." 

Six days after the adjournment of the Convention, 
answering the plea that had been made for delay in the 
matter of a division of the State, the Intelligencer said; 

"It would take a long time for us to go through a list 
of the excuses of one kind or another that were urged, and 
could be plausibly urged, against a division. To sum 
them ujD — for we are compelled to be brief — there is 
neither distraction nor revolution, nor broken faith, in the 
action of the Convention. Revolution implies violence 
and illegality; or, if you please, unconstitutionality. 
There is nothing of the kind in the action of the Conven- 
tion. They have taken their steps legally and in order, 
just as it is provided by the Constitution of the United 
States that they should be taken. The question is all open 
from the beginning to the end. It is first to be submitted 
to the people ; it is next to be submitted to the Legislature ; 
and next to Congress. The manner prescribed by the 
Constitution is fully and entirely complied with and even 
more. Whence then comes the opposition on this score ? 
And as to implied faith with Union men of Eastern Vir- 
ginia or of the Valley, there is nothing in it worthy of 
serious consideration. As Union men we are Union to 
them still. The bond of Unionism — national Unionism 
— with them remains just as ever. In common with the 



THE PEOPLE FOR DIVISION. 387 

Union men from other States, the men of Western Vir- 
ginia will go on fighting the battle for the Union in Vir- 
ginia. Aside from that bond, old scores and natural 
boundaries stand as they have all along." 

In a review of the new State proposition in the Mor- 
gantown Star in September, the suggestion was made that 
when it should become necessary for the restored govern- 
ment to give way to the jurisdiction of the new State, it 
could remove its temporary capital to Winchester or Alex- 
andria, then within the Federal lines, pending the sub- 
jugation of the remainder of Virginia. This seems to 
have been the first public suggestion of the way out of a 
difficulty which had troubled some members of the Con- 
vention. 

October 8th, the Intelligencer notes the prospect that 
the ordinance for division would be carried by "an over- 
whelming majority. Our correspondence and our ex- 
changes" says the editor "induce us to believe that the 
people are getting to be almost a unit in favor of the mcas- 
ure. 

RESULT OF ELECTION. 

Day by day and week after week the interest in the 
coming election grew. Two days after the election, the 
Intelligencer said : 

So far as we have had reports from the election on Thurs- 
day, they show an astonishing unanimity among the people in 
favor of a new State. 

The result of the election was a surprise all around. 
Opponents of division were surprised at the popular 
unanimitv in favor of it. Friends of the measure were 



388 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

surprised to find the people so far in advance of their 
estimates. The expression was nearly all one way. Ka- 
nawha which had been overrun by Wise in the eai*ly Sum- 
mer voted 1,039 for division, one against. Putnam gave 
209 to none; Cabell, 200 to none; Harrison, 1,148 to 2; 
Marion, 760 to 38; Monongalia, 1,591 to 18; Upshur, 
Gil: to none ; Randolph, 171 to 2. The official vote as com- 
municated by the Secretary of the Commonwealth to the 
constitutional convention in December, was 18,408 for 
division, to 781 against. 

PEOPLE COULD NOT BE FOOLED. 

iNovember 5th the Intelligencer said: 

The people thoroughly understood the gist of the whole 
outcry against present expediency. They recognized this plain 
and palpable fact that the men who got it up were not friends of 
the new State, and at no other time would they be a bit more 
likely to vote for it than now. They seized the strong common- 
sense view of the subject as if by intuition and determined that 
whether the project succeeded or not before Congress, the world 
should see that it was the choice of the people of the Northwest 
to have a new State, and that they were not one whit less firm 
and inflexible towards the Eastern Virginia usurpers now than 
they were last spring. Had we voted down the new State, that 
would have ended it. We never in this generation could have 
brought it to a vote again. All our talk for the past twenty- 
five years would have been considered as retracted. 

THE MAIN QUESTION PRESENTS ITSELF. 

And now a new question began to raise itself in the 
foreground. Not new in its nature; rather as old as the 
question of division itself ; but new in the sense that for 



WHAT TO DO WITH SLAVERY? 381) 

the first time it had to be met with some practical solu- 
tion. It had been settled by the result of the election that 
Western Virginia would go to Congress for admission into 
the Union; and the question what to do with slavery in 
view of that ordeal would have to be answered in the 
constitution to be framed by the Convention to assemble 
November 26th. On the morning of that day, the dele- 
gates were greeted in the editorial columns of the Intelli- 
gencer with an introduction to the question on which the 
issue of new Statehood was ultimately to turn : 

The convention to form a constitution for a new State out 
of the territory of the Commonwealth of Virginia meets to-day 
in this city. It is one of the most important bodies ever con- 
vened in any State of this Union. Its action will possess a 
national interest. Its assemblage marks an era in the history 
of the great rebellion. It meets in response to the all but 
unanimous call of the loyal people of more than thirty-nine 
counties of Western Virginia. 

NO, THANK YOU ! 

There had been some newspaper talk about a general 
dismemberment of Virginia, the contemplated transfer of 
Accomac and ^Northampton Counties to the State of Mary- 
land, and the suggestion that such a partition might throw 
the Valley to the new State to be formed west of the 
mountains. Touching this, the editor continues: 

For our part, we hope to escape the affliction of being 
united to the Valley— notwithstanding the many loyal people that 
are there and the two or three loyal counties that have voted to 
come with us. The greatest portion of the Valley is as 
antagonistic to the West as ever was the Tide-water region. We 
want a homogeneous State. Such we never could have united 



390 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

to the Valley. Negroes are their staple. They are not ours. We 
want to get clear of negroes. The Valley does not. We want 
in a few years to become a free State. If, however, the wish 
shall become anyways general among the people of the Valley, 
when this rebellion shall have been put down, to join us, they 
can do so by adopting the free-state policy which the West will 
have originated. In this way only, and with this understanding 
only, would their acquisition be of any benefit. We do not wish 
to be connected any longer with the miserable one-idead negro 
policy that has cursed us all the days of our lives thus far. 
That policy has always been arrogant, selfish and absorbing. 
We have had enough of it. Let us have a natural State. Our 
interests lie eastward, not southward. It is the capital, skill 
and enterprise and hardy manhood of the Eastern States that 
are to develop Western Virginia; that are to build cities and 
towns, villages, factories and workshops, school-houses and 
churches, in places now almost unknown within our limits. We 
know that without foreign enterprise labor and capital, the city 
of Wheeling would have been nothing. We know that Western 
Virginia without these same helps will be nothing in a hun- 
dred years to come. 

What we want, then, is a policy that will meet the case; and 
that policy is obviously and manifestly a free-State policy. Let 
feudalism and every species of middle-ageism and all sorts of 
anti-progress be kept out of our constitution from the start. 
Do not let us build up hindrances and stumbling-blocks for 
those who shall come after us. Our bitter experience ought to 
teach us compassion for our successors. Will we be equal to the 
emergenjty? We shall see within the next few weeks. 



CHAPTER XV. 

FBAMING THE ORGANIC LAW— ITS ADOPTION BY 
THE PEOPLE— LEGISLATIVE CONSENT. 

THE CONVENTION MEETS. 

The delegates chosen to frame a constitution for the 
proposed new State of Kanawha met in the United States 
court-room, in the Federal building, in the city of Wheel- 
ing at 11 a.,m. iSTovember 26, 1861. Chapman J. Stuart 
of Doddridge County called the body to order, and on his 
motion the venerable John Hall, of Mason, was made tem- 
porary chairman and Gibson L. Cranmer, of Wheeling, 
temporary secretary. Delegates from thirty-one counties 
answered roll-call. The following were later found to be 
entitled to seats : 

Cabell — Granville Parker. 

Braxton — Gustavus F. Taylor. 

Barbour — Emmet J. O'Brien. 

Boone — Robert Hagar. 

Brooke — James Hervey. 

Clay — Benjamin Stephenson. 

Doddridge — Chapman J. Stuart. 

Gilmer — William Warder. 

Hardy — Abijah Dolly. 

Hancock — Joseph S. Pomeroy. 

Harrison — Thomas W. Harrison and John M. Powell. 

39i 



392 THE REXDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

Jackson — E. S. Mahon. 

Kanawha — James H. Brown and Lewis Ruffner. . 

Lewis — Robert Irvine. 

Marion — Eptiraim B. Hall and Hiram Haymond. 

Marshall — Elbert H. Caldwell and Thomas H. Trainer, 

Hampshire — Thomas R. Carskadon and George Sheets. 

Monongalia — Waitman T. Willey and Henry Bering. 

Mason — John Hall. 

Pleasants — Joseph Hubbs. 

Preston — John J. Brown and John A. Dille. 

Putnam — Dudley S. Montague. 

Raleigh — Stephen N. Hansley. 

Randolph — Josiah Simmons. 

Roane — Henry D. Chapman. 

Ritchie — A. J. "Wilson. 

Upshur — Richard L. Brooks. 

Taylor — Harmon Sinsel. 

Tyler — Abraham D. Soper. 

Tucker — James W. Parsons. 

Wayne — William W. Brumfield. 

Wetzel— R. W. Lauck. 

Wirt — Benjamin F. Stewart. 

Ohio — James W. Paxton, Daniel Lamb and Gordon Battelle. 

Wood — Peter G. Van Winkle and William E. Stevenson. 

Subsequently tlie following additional delegates were 
admitted : 

Fayette — James S. Cassidy. 
Wyoming — William Walker. 
Calhoun — .Job Robinson. 
Logan — Benjamin H. Smith. 
Mercer — Richard M. Cook. 
McDowell— J. P. Hoback. 
Nicholas — John R, McCutchen. 

John Hall of Mason was made permanent President 
and Ellery E. Hall, then from Tavlor, afterwards resi- 
dent at Fairmont, permanent Secretary. 



MAKING THE COXSTITUTION. 393 

TO SWEAR OR NOT TO SWEAR. 

A discussion arose on a suggestion made by Mr. Lamb 
that the members take the oath prescribed by the ordi- 
nance for the reorganization of the State government. 
Mr. Stevenson of Wood suggested whether it would be 
proper for them to take an oath to maintain the constitu- 
tion of Virginia when they were here for the purpose of 
either partly or totally superceding it with another. Mr. 
Willey supposed the suggestion was made as a test of the 
loyalty of members. For his part, he came here endorsed 
by his constituents as a loyal man, worthy of their confi- 
dence. It seemed too much like suspecting themselves to 
prescribe oaths to a body that was above all the ordinary 
requirements of legislation. Mr. Van Winkle said they 
met under authority of the restored government of Vir- 
ginia, which paid their wages and provided every neces- 
sary to forward the objects of the Convention. He read 
from the ordinance calling the body together : ''That the 
government of the State of Virginia as reorganized by 
the June Convention, shall retain within the territory of 
the proposed State, undiminished and imimpaired, all the 
force and authority with which it has been vested until the 
proposed State shall be admitted into the Union by the 
Congress of the United States." In the ordinance of re- 
organization was prescribed an oath for all the officers of 
the State government and the members of both houses of 
the General Assembly. It was true the ordinance did not 
ask this body to take the oath ; but holding their authority 
under the State government, he thought courtesy and that 



594 THE EENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

feeling of duty they owed the State made it proper and 
decorous that the oath shoukl be administered to the offi- 
cers and members of this Convention. Mr. Dille did not 
see the necessity of taking the oath, which seemed to him 
without authority and merely a test of the loyalty of mem- 
bers. Mr. Lamb disclaimed any intention to propose such 
a test. Mr. Brown of Kanawha held they had no right to 
prescribe oaths to each other not required by the law under 
which they were assembled. None doubted their loyalty, 
and oaths were too sacred to be made common by prescrib- 
ing them to one another without authority of law. Mr. 
Hall of Marion thought it was no time to hesitate about 
taking the oath. He believed every man present was loyal, 
but he was unwilling they should seem to hesitate. Mr. 
liamb put his suggestion into the form of a motion. Mr. 
Sinsel moved to indefinitely postpone it, but the Conven- 
tion refused by 28 to 14. The motion was adopted and 
the oath administered to the members by the Secretary. 
In the second day's session, Mr. Van Winkle, from 
the committee appointed for the purpose, reported a plan 
for distributing the work. Conmiittees were agreed to 
with chairmen as follows: 

I On Fundamental and General Provisions, Van Winkle. 
On County Organization, Pomeroy. 
On Legislative Department, Lamb. 
On Executive Department, Caldwell. 
On Judiciary Department, Willey. 
On Taxation and Finance, Paxton. 
On Education, Battelle. 
Schedule, Hall of Marion. 



MAKING THE CONSTITUTION. 395 

EEPOETING DEBATES. 

Mr. Van Winkle proposed an inquiry into the pro- 
priety of having the debates officially reported and pub- 
lished. The committee in whose hands the matter was 
placed took no action till December 16th, when they were 
discharged from further consideration of the subject. One 
of the press reporters who was making a daily synopsis 
of the proceedings was preserving a verbatim report, and 
it was the discovery of this fact which led Mr. Van Winkle 
to make the effort he did to have the record preserved. 

A committee of nine on boundaries was raised, on sug- 
gestion of Mr.. Lamb, and Mr. Stuart of Doddridge made 
chairman of it. 

'PARLIAMENTAKY COTJP. 

Mr. Dolly in the ninth day's session, with a fine ap- 
preciation of their authority, offered a resolution to "re- 
peal the act of the former Convention on boundary." He 
did not understand apparently that the Convention which 
had permitted them to be brought together had the right 
to prescribe exactly what they might do, and that they 
had no powers beyond those with which that Convention 
had invested them: that the superior Convention, repre- 
senting the whole State of Virginia having limited in pre- 
cise terms the territory out of which the new State might 
be formed, this limited, subordinate body had no authority 
to include another inch. There was the same kind of as- 
sumption of ungranted authority in regard to the name 
a day or so later. 



896 THE EENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

A FREE STATE. 

On the fourteenth day, Robert Hagar from Boone 
County, a Methodist preacher, a rugged old anti-slavery 
patriot, who had little education but a great deal of simple 
hard sense and honesty of purpose, offered for reference 
a resolution that the Convention inquire into the pro- 
])riety of making the new State a free State, by incor- 
porating in the constitution a clause for gradual emancipa- 
tion. 

THE ANTIDOTE. 

This was followed the same day by a counter resolu- 
tion from Brown of Kanawha, who, all through the Con- 
vention showed such marked pro-slavery and State rights 
leanings as to sharply suggest whether he had not made a 
mistake and got into the wrong Convention — at the wrong 
end of the State. His resolution set forth that it was 
"unwise and impolitic to introduce the discussion of the 
slavery question into the Convention." It was the same 
old policy of suppression which characterized the parti- 
sans of the institution everywhere. Even here where they 
were framing the organic law that was to govern what was 
to be one day a great, progressive, free and enlightened 
people, a vital question of economic policy, leaving out of 
sight its ethical and political aspects, must not be con- 
sidered. A question, too, which lay at the root of the 
whole movement of which this Convention was a part! 
But there was to be more of the same thing. 



MAKING THE CONSTITUTION. 397 

TO CHANGE THE NAME. 

One of the things early determined by the Convention 
was that they would not have the name. The prescrip- 
tion laid down by the creative body and contirmed by vote 
of the people concerned was "repealed/' as Dolly would 
say. Sinsel of Taylor made the motion to strike out "Ka- 
nawha." He wanted to retain the name of Virginia be- 
cause it suggested the mother of the Savior, and be- 
cause the mother State had been "named for the Virgin 
Queen." Mr. Brown of Kanawha suggested that the vestal 
character of the queen referred to was not so well attested 
as some other facts in English history. Mr. Parker ob- 
jected to the present name because there would be "too 
much Kanawha." There was a county of that name, two 
rivers, and the capital of the county was called "Kanaw^ha 
Court-House." It was liable to produce confusion in 
postal matters. 

NO MORE "vIEGINIa" FOR LAMB. 

Mr. Lamb said the name was a compromise made in 
the committee who had reported the ordinance for division, 
accepted by the August Convention and approved by the 
vote of the people. What was there to attach them to the 
name of Virginia ? He had been an inhabitant of West- 
ern Virginia thirty-odd years. During that time what 
had they received from Virginia but oppression and out- 
rage ? And they had been complaining of the policy 
forced upon them. Virginia was loaded dow'n with a debt 
created for public improvements, and where was there a 



398 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

foot of these improvements — one public building — within 
the borders of Western Virginia ? Was there anything in 
the recent proceedings at Richmond to attach them to the 
name ? Had not every measure been forced upon them 
against their protest ? "Did thej hesitate on our account 
to adopt measures not in the interest of the people but 
of the conspirators who had been leaders of the people 
heretofore in Eastern Virginia, who had attempted to 
transfer us at once, without our consent, to the Confeder- 
ate States, and would have been glad to transfer the war 
to the borders of the Ohio River ?" Were they going to 
retain the policy of Virginia along with the name, when 
they were here for the very purpose of revolutionizing 
that policy in every respect that was possible ? Or were 
they to change everything Virginian but the name and 
proclaim in the very act this Convention was about to 
adopt that they felt grateful for the favor the State of 
Virginia had theretofore bestowed on them ? No ; he 
wanted to cut loose even from these recollections ; he had 
no hesitation in proclaiming to this Convention and to 
his constituents that there was nothing in the conduct of 
Virginia that entitled her to give us a name or claim our 
attachment. The retention of the name would create the 
impression abroad that the Virginia policy was to continue 
and it would repel people from the new State. 

willey's constituents cry for it. 

Mr. Willey disclaimed any personal interest in the 
name, but his constituents were not willing to have the 
new State at all if they could not have Virginia in the 



MAKING THE COXSTITUTION. 399 

name. Yet 1,591 of Mr. Willey's "constituents" — an 
overwhelming majority — bad voted they wanted to erect 
the new State of "Kanawha," and so far as appeared, no 
protest was anywhere made against the name ! 

NO AUTHOEITY. 

Mr. Paxton held that the Convention lacked authority 
to change the name. If they could depart from the pre- 
scription in this instance, they might in any other; and 
where would the precedent lead ? 

VAN winkle's wit. 

Mr. Van Winkle feared from indications some gentle- 
men here intended to remain Virginians after the separa- 
tion. He would like to know "whether, when we have or- 
ganized a new State and we meet for the purpose of trans- 
acting business appropriate to our new situation, and there 
are questions before us relating to our peculiar circum- 
stances, we are to be told, they did not do so in old Vir- 
ginia ?" If they were so servile to old Virginia now, 
when about casting off the fetters— ^if they could not for- 
get their servile habit but must continue to cringe and 
bow the knee to their old oppressor — this movement had 
better stop precisely where it was then. They were like 
the Israelites of old ; they had crossed the Red Sea, but 
whether Pharaoh and his hosts were drowned had no pre- 
cise information. But they had just entered on the bor- 
ders of the wilderness and needed all their courage before 
they could reach the Promised Land ; and already the cry 
was going up: "Would God we had died by the hands 



400 



THE KENDING OF VIRGINIA. 




Petek G. Van Winkle. 

of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we s^t by the flesh- 
pots and when v.-e did eat bread to the full!" For his 
part he had positive objection to anything which com- 
pelled them to attach a "Virginia" to it. 

A WIDE-AWAKE "rIP." 

A notable man w^as this Peter G. Van Winkle — not for 
his public virtues alone, which were eminent, but for his 
personal qualities as well. He had come of the solid old 
Dutch Knickerbocker stock at !N'ew York, and was proud 
of it, and had a right to be. For where on the planet, past 
or present, shall we find a strain which has more nobly 
illustrated the highest human virtues than the stock from 



MAKING THE CONSTITUTION. 401 

the lo-w countries around the delta of the Rhine ? Who 
watered the tree of religious liberty with the blood of 
eighty thousand noble men and women in resistance to 
the inquisition under the unspeakable Phillip II. ; who 
are the greatest merchants and colonizers of the modern 
world ; who are just now illustrating anew, amid the veldts 
and kopjes of South Africa, the inextinguishable love of 
liberty which has characterized the race ever since Julius 
Caesar first dragged them into history out of their forests 
and morasses by the sea. Van Winkle was a man who 
united personal graces with fine intellectual gifts. A large 
brain was supported by a superb physique. He was ro- 
tund of figure, with smooth clean-shaven face ; skin white 
and clear; eyes large, blue, bright, one turned a little 
away from it fellow, giving him a wide-awake look. He 
was scrupulously neat, even dainty, in person and attire 
and looked always fresh and clean as just out of the bath. 
But the most pleasing thing about him was his great kindli- 
ness and the pure intellectuality which characterized all 
his utterances. Xo man could show a finer sense of con- 
sideration for others. His wit was keen but always 
kindly. He had the refined sensibility of a woman united 
to the mental virility of a man. He was scholarly and liter- 
ary in his tastes ; was possessed of wide knowledge on 
many subjects ; had done something in authorship with- 
out publishing; had written a book, it was understood, in 
which he had developed some special theories and crotchets 
of his own and embodied his beliefs on interesting ques- 
tions. In public bodies he never talked for talk's sake; 
he always had something to say worth hearing, pertinent 
and necessary to the matter in hand. W^hile both lawyer 

Va.-28 



402 THE REXDIK^G OF VIKGIXIA. 

and scholar, Mr. Van Winkle was also a man of affairs. 
He had a capable knowledge of large financial subjects; 
and it was his pride when in the Senate that this had 
been recognized in his appointment to be a member of the 
Senate Finance Committee. 

Mr, Stuart of Doddridge, who had made the motion 
in the August Convention to strike our Kanawha and 
substitute "West Virginia," said his constituents had 
voted for division with a protest against the name. 

LAMB CONFIRMS PAXTON. 

Mr. Lamb called attention to Mr. Paxton's point, that 
the Convention had no authority to make the change. He 
quoted the ordinance to show that the name was prescribed 
as much as any other condition, and reminded them that 
the people had confirmed the action of the Convention 
in this as in other respects. The Convention had or- 
dained that "a new State to be called the State of 
Kanawha" should be instituted, and had provided in the 
next section that the vote be taken on the formation of 
the new State "as hereinbefore proposed." He saw no 
propriety in the assumption of the power to make this 
change. 

WILLEY ASTRAY. 

Mr. Willey claimed this Convention was "as sovereign 
as the Convention that made the ordinance. We are the 
people," he said, "as much as that body was the people, 
and our action is no more final than the action of that 
body was final. Our action, as the action of that body 
didj_ has to go back for the sanction of the people." This 



MAKIXG THE COXSTITUTIOX. 403 

is a singular error for a man so well informed as j\Ir. 
Willey. The August Convention was a body with origi- 
nal powers. It represented the whole State of Virginia. 
Its action did not "go back" for confirmation by the peo- 
ple. It created this inferior, limited convention to do a 
particular work, which it was specifically provided must 
go back for confirmation by the people in the limited 
district here represented. "Our power in the premises," 
continued Mr. Willey, "is j)erf ect ; and settling this ques- 
tion on any other interpretation of our powers Avould very 
much hamper us in regard to projects of vastly more 
moment that will be before the Convention. We are pro- 
posing absolutely and unconditionally to include in the 
N^ew State a very considerable number of other counties 
riot included in the ordinance. Yet I think we have the 
power to do so. It is to go back to the people." Ihe 
fallacy in Mr. Willey's position lay in the fact that this 
action went back for the ratification of the people within 
the limits of the l^ew State only, not to the people of the 
State of Virginia by whose convention the boundary for 
the !N'ew State had been limited. The change of name 
it would seem from Mr. Willey's language was the enter- 
ing wedge to the "projects of vastly more moment," which 
included the unauthorized inclusion of districts which, if 
taken in, would have defeated the 'New State entirely. 

BATTELLE WANTS SOMETHING "fEESH." 

Mr. Battelle supported the position taken by Mr. 
Paxton. "!N^ot only," he said, "did the ordinance fix the 
name but it has been ratified by solemn vote of the people ; 



404 THE KEXDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

and I find, so far as I understand mj powers and duties 
here, no warrant to go behind that vote of the people. We 
are now forming a new State. I, for one, want a new 
name- — a fresh name — which if not symbolical of new 
ideas would at least be indicative of our deliverance from 
very old ones." 

BUT DOESN^T GET IT. 

"Kanawha" was stricken out by a vote of 30 to 14. 
"West Virginia" was substituted by an affirmative vote 
of 30, the remainder of the vote scattering between 
"Kanawha," "Western Virginia," "Allegheny" and "Au- 
gusta." 

Stuart's boundary drag-net. 

December 5th Mr. Stuart made his first report on 
boundaries. As foreshadowed by Mr. Willey, he proposed 
to take in, outside of territory included under the August 
ordinance, without conditions, Greenbrier, Pocahontas, 
Monroe, Mercer, McDowell, Buchanan and Wise, and 
contingently other districts as follows : 

1. Craig, Giles, Bland, Tazewell, Russell, Lee and 
Scott. 

2. Jefferson, Berkeley, Frederick, Morgan, Hamp- 
shire, Hardy, Pendleton, Highland, Bath and Allegheny. 

3. Clark, Warren, Shenandoah, Page, Rockingham, 
Augusta, Rockbridge and Boutetourt. 

AN UNPOPULAR PAIR. 

The names "Buchanan and Wise" had become odious 
for other than geographical reasons. In the consideration 
of the counties to be embraced without submitting the 



MAKING THE CONSTITUTION. 405 

question to them, Mr. Lamb moved to strike out these two. 
On this motion the Convention entered upon a discussion 
of the whole problem of boundaries, involving the power 
of the Convention to go outside the delimitations laid 
down by the AugTist Convention and the expediency of 
including any or all the districts proposed by the com- 
mittee. The debate was one of the most important and 
interesting of the session. It occupied the Convention 
from the 5th to the 12th of December and fills more than 
four hundred closely written pages of manuscript. The 
purpose foreshadowed in the change of name was in a 
limited way embodied in the result. 

The August ordinance authorizing a vote on division 
and constituting this Convention had provided that in 
addition to the thirty-nine counties specifically included 
in the proposed State, there should be embraced "the 
counties of Greenbrier and Pocahontas, or either of them, 
and also the counties of Hampshire, Hardy, Morgan, 
Berkeley and Jefferson, or either of them, and such other 
counties as lie contiguous to the said boundaries, or to 
the counties named in this section, if the said counties 
to be added or either of them" should by a majority of the 
votes cast at the same election signify their wish to be 
included and choose delegates to this Convention. The 
only delegates who had presented themselves under this 
provision from any of these counties outside of the thirty- 
nine were from Hardy and Hampshire. 

Finally a vote was reached on Mr. Lamb's motion and 
Buchanan and Wise were eliminated. Mr. Willey then 
proposed a resolution setting forth that those seven coun- 
ties (including Buchanan and Wise) ought to be included 



406 THE RENDIXCt of VIRGINIA. 

and that if at an election held for the purpose at a blank 
date in those counties a majority of the votes cast in the 
district composino- them, and in a majority of the coun- 
ties, should be in favor of the constitution when submitted, 
the Legislature should be requested, in giving its consent, 
to include that district. Mr. Willey who, in the matter 
of the name, had strongly declared this Convention might 
disregard the prescription of the August Convention, took 
the other tack when it came to including more territory. 
He WTnt over the question elaborately and abl,y and showed 
that the Convention was clearly bound to respect the 
limits set by the August Convention, and that none of 
the territory w^hich had not complied with the strict terms 
of that ordinance could be included without its consent. 
The effect of his proposition to wait for that consent in 
the case of the five counties first named would have proved 
a very serious embarrassment to the progress of the i!^ew 
State movement, for those counties lay within the Con- 
federate lines and were in no condition to act upon a 
matter of this kind. 

TO CLOG NEW STATE. 

Brown of Kanawha, w^ho led the movement for em- 
barrassment and delay, and w^ho was especially deter- 
mined to take in the rebellious districts east of the 
Alleghenies in the Southwest, was not troubled by any of 
Mr. Willey's scruples. In the matter of the name he 
thought they were bound by the August ordinance. "I 
maintain," he said, "that the people have ratified this 
question and have determined by our presence here that 



MAKlNlx THE COJNSTITUTION. 407 

the new State shall exist and that it shall be called 
'Kanawha.' " But now the boot was on the other leg! 
Willey had turned one way, Brown the other. Circum- 
stances do alter cases ! In one speech Mr. Brown per- 
mitted it to appear that he wanted this southern territory 
to give weight to his end of the State in case the State 
should, perchance, come to maturity, a contingency, how- 
ever, that would never have troubled him if his plans 
could have been carried out. 

ME. LAMB DRAWS THE LINE. 

Mr. Lamb, who perceived very clearly the effect of 
these propositions for enlargement and delay, reminded 
the Convention that he had not been in favor of the move- 
ment for division when it was begun ; but having been 
overruled and sent here to make a constitution, he pro- 
posed in good faith to do what he could to carry out the 
wishes of his people. He recognized the lack of direct 
authority to exceed the limits and conditions laid down 
by the August Convention ; but, believing the welfare of 
the 'New State required some territory in addition to the 
thirty-nine counties, and recognizing the well established 
rule of law that what is impossible is not required, he 
thought this might be brought in and that the irregularity 
would be cured by the consent to be given by the Legis- 
lature. Mr. Van Winkle held a similar attitude, and 
especially advocated the inclusion of the counties along 
the foot of the valley covering the line of the Baltimore 
& Ohio Railroad, 



408 THE EENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

GOOD ENOUGH FOR BROWN OF PRESTON. 

Brown of Preston held there was no authority to 
include more than the fortj-one counties represented in 
this Convention, and that it was not even desirable to do 
so. These gave them a convenient, compact and homo- 
geneous State, and prudence forbade them endangering its 
success by attempts to extend a doubtful authority over 
territory not suited or desirable. He said if all the coun- 
ties recommended by the committee were taken in there 
would be in the New State a secession population of over 
303,000 as against 224,000 loyal. Dille, Battelle, Brooks, 
Powell and some others held similar ground. 

THE LAW OF MIGHT. 

Brown of Kanawha, with an eye to the Southwestern 
districts, quoted Vattel on the law of nations to show the 
Convention might take any territory it thought necessary. 
''Whenever," says Vattel, "a territory becomes essential 
to the prosperity and safety of a State, it may be pur- 
chased if it can, or, if it cannot, it may be taken." Such 
State being, of course, the judge of the exigency ! This 
would be a very convenient "law" for a strong State, but 
might be very inconvenient for a weak one. Mr. Brown 
instanced Jefferson's purchase of Louisiana as an illus- 
tration of Vattel's law, the inference being that Jefferson 
was prepared to seize the territory if Napoleon had de- 
clined to sell. Vattel's law has had many modern illus- 
trations — European spoliation in Africa and in China, 
especially Great Britain's attempted conquest of the Boe* 



MAKING THE COXSTITUTION. 409 

Republics, and Russia's seizure of Mancliuria. Mr. Wil- 
ley, in defining his position, made the point that in chang- 
ing the name of the State the Convention had wronged no 
one because that concerned nobody outside the State lim- 
its; but to attempt to take outside territory trenched on 
the rights of others. The effect of Mr. Willey's motion, 
however, if successful, would have been to aid Mr. Brown's 
campaign of delay and embarrassment. 

The outcome of this preliminary discussion was that 
the counties of Pocahontas, Greenbrier, Monroe, Mercer 
and McDowell were included absolutely, Mr. Willey's 
proposition having been rejected. 

The boundary question, after several days' discussion 
over the other districts proposed by the committee, was 
disposed of by including conditionally only Pendleton, 
Hardy, Hampshire, Morgan, Berkeley, Jefferson and 
Frederick, all of which were afterwards incorporated 
except Frederick. 

A MODEST PROPOSITION. 

In considering the option given this group of counties 
lying along the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, at the foot 
of the Valley, Mr. Brown of Kanawha again brought for- 
ward his scheme to place in the same category the coun- 
ties of Lee, Scott, Wise, Russell, Buchanan, Tazewell, 
Bland, Craig, Allegheny, Bath, Highland, Loudon, Alex- 
andria, Fairfax, Northampton and Accomac. This time 
Mr. Brown had crossed the Chesapeake Bay and reached 
the Atlantic ! Mr. Battelle's suggestion that he ought to 
"just include the whole State" was apt. What purpose 



410 THE RE^^DIXG OF VIEGINIA, 

Mr. Brown sought by such impossible propositions is not 
easily explicable unless it was to ridicule and embarrass 
the whole New State movement. He certainly showed 
scant respect for the Convention. 

Upon this, Hiram Haymond of Marion, declared he 
never would consent to add another inch to territory al- 
ready included. Xo friend of West Virginia could vote 
for such a motion. ^'Take in those counties," he said, 
"and our labors are at an end and I, for one, would be 
ready to go home." Henry Bering of Monongalia con- 
curred. If these counties could be taken in, he said, they 
woTdd give the Reactionists control of the iSTew State and 
defeat the object of its creation. The adoption of the 
resolution would be the death-knell of the New State, and 
if adopted they may as well go home. 

Mr. Battelle suggested to Mr. Brown that he was 
"entirely too modest. You ought to just take in the whole 
State," said Battelle. 

Mr. Brown's proposition was defeated by a decisive 
vote. Those who voted for it were: Hall of Mason, 
Brown of Kanawha, Chapman, Carskadon, Dolly, Hubbs, 
Montague, McCutchen, Simmons, Stephenson of Clay, 
Sheets, Smith and Taylor. 

WEST VIRGINIA INCLUDES THE OHIO RIVER. 

When the report had been finally disposed of, it was 
recommitted and the committee directed to prepare a pro- 
vision defining the boundaries of the New State. Touch- 
ing this Mr. Van Winkle remarked: 

Uuder the ordinance establishing Kentucky— which was an- 
terior, I think, to that erecting the Northwest Territory— the juris- 
diction of Kentucky extended to the north bank; and under the 



MAKING THE CONSTITUTION. -ill 

cession of the Northwest Territory the claim is made, while the 
jurisdiction for some purposes is concurrent, to the far bank of the 
Ohio as^the territory of Virginia at this time, by which of course 
all the islands belong to Virginia. If the river were made the 
boundary, then we take the middle of the channel and that in 
most cases would throw the islands to the other side. It may be 
remembered that this question was before the General Court 
while that existed, a case arising from the apprehension of some 
abolitionists on the Ohio side of the river opposite my county. 
The court was then composed of twenty-one judges, I believe. 
It turned out that there were three opinions in the court. One 
went for high-water mark; one for running-water mark, and the 
third for low-water mark. And as there was not a majority for 
either there could be no decision. It was a very singular case, 
but they had to admit the parties to bail and let them go. Still 
the claim is to the other side of the river and it would be 
proper for consideration whether we should not, in the language 
in which the old ordinance is couched, repeat the claim in this 
constitution. 

The constitution as finally adopted described the 
boundaries of West Virginia by reciting the counties in- 
cluded and adding the following: 

The State of West Virginia shall also include so much of 
the bed, banks and shores of the Ohio River as heretofore apper- 
tained to the State of Virginia; and the territorial rights and 
property in and the jurisdiction of whatever nature over the 
said bed, banks and shores heretofore reserved by or vested in 
the State of Virginia shall vest in and be hereafter exercised by 
the State of West Virginia. 



CAN THERE BE TREASON AGAINST A STATE ? 

In a discussion on fundamental provisions December 
13th, under consideration the section of the committee's 
report undertaking to define "treason against the State," 
and provide punishment for it, Mr. Van Winkle, chair- 
man in charge of the report, said: 



412 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

There have been great doubts — and I think very well- 
founded — whether there is such a thing as "treason" against a 
State. The United States Government undertakes the conduct 
of wars that are to be conducted in or on behalf of the States. 
States are not, by the Constitution of the United States, per- 
mitted to keep armies or ships of war in time of peace. The 
United States is bound to repel the invasion of any State and, 
upon proper application, to suppress any insurrection arising 
within any State. The qualification that application shall be 
made I shall only construe as being to prevent the necessity of 
the United States forces being called forth on trivial occasions. 
It is hard at some times to distinguish between a mere riot and 
an insurrection; but whenever the State notifies the general 
Government in a proper way that there is an insurrection within 
its borders, the United States is bound to suppress it. It is 
true the State may use the militia; but the militia is put under 
control of the United States in time of war. 

Who can be enemies of the State, therefore, unless they 
are at the same time enemies of the United States? And if 
enemies of the United States, the act of treason is an offence 
not against the State, but against the United States. The first 
official recognition of this restored government was an applica- 
tion to the President on the information that the State was in 
a state of insurrection and a call on the United States for aid in 
suppressing it. The reply was almost immediate from the de- 
partment that the aid would be furnished. That was the first 
formal recognition of the restored government. The documents 
accompany the Governor's message. We hold that all expense 
incurred by this restored government, or by the government of 
any of the loyal States, in suppressing this rebellion, in defend- 
ing their own territory against the rebels or insurrectionists, 
must be reimbursed to the State by the general government — 
and upon this very principle, that the war was the war of the 
general government. It was only the war of the States so far 
as they were part of the United States. 

If this be correct, the other conclusion follows, that treason 
can be committed only against the United States. There is not, 
and has not been, in the Constitution of the United States any 
such clause. There is a statute, however, which defines treason 



MAKING THE CONSTITUTION. 413 

in this way and makes other acts, for instance the setting up of 
another government, treason against the State. 

Not anticipating that this question would arise here this 
evening, I am not as fully prepared to give my views on it as I 
might have been, but think I have stated the leading principles 
which must govern in this discussion. I have conferred with 
legal gentlemen outside the Convention and believe they are of 
the same opinion. I think a similar decision has been made 
by the Supreme Court of the United States, though I have not 
recently seen the decision itself and cannot say precisely how far 
it goes. I am sorry the member from Monongalia has been 
compelled to leave us. I had some conversation with him on 
the subject and think he was very clear that there could be no 
treason against a State of this Nation. 

Mr. Lamb: It seems to me entirely unnecessary to put any 
provision on this subject into the State constitution. I believe 
there is no provision on the subject of treason in the present 
constitution of Virginia. There is no provision in it on the 
subject of murder. Yet that does not prevent the Legislature 
from enacting "proper laws to prevent that, offense. Why not 
leave this on the same footing? 

Mr. Brown of Kanawlia took the other side of the 
question and elaborated the general States rights view. 
He referred to the case of John Brown at Harper's Ferrj, 
who was indicted for treason against Virginia, tried and 
convicted in a Virginia court, sentenced and executed ; 
and he quoted Wise's insulting announcement that when 
Virginia was done with Brown "the United States could 
have the residue for any treason against the United 
States." He denied that an insurrection in a State is 
necessarily an insurrection against the United States, and 
that the United States "can assume upon itself to put it 
down without being first called upon by the State govern- 
ment." "I maintain," he said, "within the borders of the 



414 THE BENDING OF VIEGINIA. 

State the jurisdiction of the State. When a local insur- 
rection arises within that border it is against the State 
government, not against the United States government. 
I'he United States has no right to enter the territory with 
her army or interfere with the local regulations of the 
State until, as prescribed in the Constitution of the United 
States, the Governor or the Legislature calls upon the 
President to aid us." 

Mr. Van Winkle read from a manual a reference to 
Story's Commentaries, p. 171 : ''A State cannot take 
cognizance of or punish the crime of treason against the 
United States. As treason is a crime whose object is the 
overthrow of the government, and as the government of 
the State is guaranteed by that of the United States, it 
follows there can be no treason against a State which is 
not also treason against the United States." Concerning 
John Brown, Mr. Van Winkle remarked that he could 
not take that case as much authority, "especially accom- 
panied with that declaration of Governor Wise that when 
thq State was done with John Brown and his confederates 
the general government could have what was left of them. 
I should think, sir, it was only the first act of the rebel- 
lion. I do not know how it happened that the United 
States officers did not claim jurisdiction in that case. But 
I cannot think the case as tried before the circuit court 
there decides anything in reference to the matter in ques- 
tion." 

Mr. Brown, of Kanawha: The gentleman perhaps has but 
little regard for the authorities of Virginia, as 1 should infer 
from the last remark he made, and may have a good deal for 



MAKING THE CONSTITUTION". 415 

Judge Story, or the book from which he reads. Surely the re- 
marks of Governor Wise could not affect the validity of a 
judicial decision. 

Mr. Van Winkle: I say the language in which that remark 
was couched, and the spirit in which it was conceived, indi- 
i'ated a rebellious spirit against the United States; and the 
whole transaction may have been in the same spirit. They 
claimed a right to punish where they had no right. 

Mr. Brown denied this. The question in this case was 
^vhether treason could be committed against a State. That ques- 
tion was then decided by the proper judicial tribunal to which 
the law had referred the case. The ablest counsel in the country 
were there; the most learned lawyers went there to test that 
very question. The Attorney-General was very strenuous that 
if anything wrong was done to that man the power of the 
Nation should be brought to his rescue; but everything was 
legitimate, and it was carried to the court of appeals of Vir- 
ginia, who refused a supersedeas. * * * Would it be possible 
that these men would be allowed under this plain state of the 
case to be tried and sentenced to hang for an offence that could 
not be committed? 

Mr. Van Winkle asked Mr. Brown whether in his 
opinion the government of the United States could have 
punished John Brown. Mr. Brown replied that he had 
''no doubt about it." "If thej could," said Mr. Van 
"Winkle, "then it was treason against the United States; 
and if it is treason against the United States, my point 
is simply that the State cannot punish him." 



EMANCIPATION. 



On the sixteenth day, Mr. Battelle offered for refer- 
ence a provision embracing these propositions : 

1. No slave shall be brought into the State for permanent 
residence after the adoption of this constitution. 



416 THE RENDI.XG OF VIRGINIA. 

2. The Legislature shall have full power to make such 
just and humane provisions as may be needful for the better 
regulation and security of the marriage and family relations 
between slaves, for their proper instruction, and for the gradual 
and equitable removal of slavery from the State. 

3. On and after the 4th of July, 18 — , slavery or involuntary 
servitude, except for crime, shall cease within the limits of this 
State. 

January 27th, Mr. Battelle introduced for reference 

the following : 

1. No slave shall be brought into the State for permanent 
residence after the adoption of this constitution. 

2. All children born of slave parents in this State on and 
after the 4th day of July, 1865, shall be free; and the Legisla- 
ture may provide by general laws for the apprenticeship of such 
children during their minority and for their subsequent coloniza- 
tion. 

Touching the question thus introduced in the Conven- 
tion, the InfcU'igencer, Decenilxr OtL, said: 

We have endeavored to show how entirely adverse to the 
best interests of Western Virginia it would be for the present 
convention to adjourn without first engrafting a free-State pro- 
vision on our constitution in the shape of a three, five or ten 
years emancipation clause. We should esteem it far better that 
the Convention had never assembled that than it should omit 
to take action of this character. * * * Congress will hesi- 
tate long before it will consent to the subdivision of a slave 
State simply that two slave States may be made out of it. The 
evil which has so nearly destroyed not only Western Virginia 
but the whole country will find that its tug of war is yet to 
come when it has even run the gauntlet of our Convention and 
our Legislature. We believe when it reaches Congress it will 
reach its hitherto and that it will never pass. It will avail 
very little for this Convention to remain in debate on this sub- 
ject for a month at a heavy expense and consummate a work 
which will only at last end in defeat and entail upon its framers 



MAKIXa THE CO^VSTITUTION. 417 

the cold distrust of the only friends they have in the world. 
The loyal masses of the free States who are fighting the great 
battle of constitutional freedom, who are endeavoring to stay 
the absorbing and consuming demands of slavery upon this con- 
tinent, will never consent that in the very midst of them it 
shall burst out in a new place with the extraordinary demand 
that its present representation of a State in the Senate shall be 
doubled. * * * We say, then, to the members of our Con- 
vention that before you waste your time and money on a con- 
stitution you look to its probable fate. 

On the same question about this time, the Cincinnati 
Commercial made the following comment: \ 

The Convention cannot ignore the causes which have led 
to the disruption of the State; that have imposed heavy burdens 
of taxation on the people of Western Virginia and rendered 
their political and commercial influence nugatory upon all occa- 
sions. Slavery has not been profitable to the people of Western 
Virginia. Its presence has prevented immigration, dwarfed en- 
terprise and delayed the development of the physical resources 
of the country. The people have paid a heavy price to insure 
the safety of his sacred and sable majesty; and in severing their 
connection with the eastern part of the State, it is natural they 
should submit to the people for whom it is devised the question 
whether they do not desire the complete severance from the 
cause of their heavy burdens in the past. 

"tOM^" HARRISON WANTS THE OLD CONSTITUTION. 

In the nineteenth day's session, Thomas W. Harrison 
of Harrison distinguished himself by offering a proposi- 
tion that the Virginia constitution be referred to a com- 
mittee of five with instructions to modify it so as to adapt 
it to the territory embraced in the new State and to pro- 
vide for the formation of a new constitution at some fu- 
ture time. 

Va.-27 



418 THE KENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

The Richmond Secession Convention had a short time 
before closed its sitting, after having made numerous 
alterations in the Virginia constitution. One of these 
empowered the General Assembly to prohibit the future 
emancipation of slaves; so that a slave-owner who from 
conscience or other reason might desire to emancipate 
would have to choose between remaining an owner and 
selling his slaves in the market: it being thus rendered 
impossible that the slave should become free. This looked 
to making the institution iron-clad in the Confederacy. 

AND GETS AN EXTINGUISHEK. 

Mr. Van Winkle said Mr. Harrison's proposition was 
a larger "hankering after the flesh-pots" than he had 
expected. He supposed the "charms of that old constitu- 
tion, which had recently been modified and amended under 
the auspices of ^Sandy' Stuart in the Richmond Conven- 
tion, by which every poor man is to be deprived of a vote 
and by which one class was to be made everybody and the 
other nobody, were so fixed in the gentleman's affections 
that he would like to include those recent amendments." 
He moved Mr. Harrison's resolution be indefinitely post- 
poned. The Convention so voted by 41 to 2. 

ANOTHER OLD FOGY. 

Mr. Dille was another who found it hard to tear him- 
self away from the ways of old Virginia. When it came 
to the suffrage provision, which had been drawn by Mr. 
Van Winkle on the broadest lines then feasible — imposing 



MAKING THE CONSTITUTION. 419 

no restriction except for crime — Dille moved an amend- 
ment to make the payment of a State and county tax a 
pre-requisite. Mr, Van Winkle declared he would dis- 
franchise no man except for grave crime. He would not 
put the failure to pay a small tax — which in some cases 
might be unavoidable — on the same footing as treason, 
felony or bribery in an election. ''Do you know," he 
asked, ''how much a man was worth in Virginia under 
the old constitution f In the year 1850, he said, accord- 
ing to the lists of that year, $532 of property was the unit 
of representation. That is to say that $532 of negro or 
other property counted as much in representation and had 
as much weight in the Commonwealth as a white man. 
"Under the old constitution," he said, "a man who was 
competent under the Constitution of the United States 
tc fill a seat in Congress might be disfranchised for the 
omission to pay twelve and one-half cents tax." 

TO SUBMIT EMANCIPATION TO THE PEOPLE. 

In the afternoon session of February 12th, Mr. Bat- 
telle offered the following : 

1. Resolved, That at the same time when this constitution 
is submitted to the qualified voters of the proposed new State 
to be voted for or against, an additional section to Article — , 
in the words following: 

"No slave shall be brought or free person of color 
come into this State for permanent residence after this 
constitution goes into operation; and all children 
born of slave mothers after the year 1870 shall be free, 
the males at the age of 28 and the females at the age of 
18 years; and the children of such females shall be free 
at birth." 



420 THE EEXDIXG OF VIKGIXIA. 

Shall be separately submitted to the qualified voters of the 
proposed new State for their adoption or rejection; and if the 
majority of tte votes cast for and against said additional sec- 
tion are in favor of its adoption, it shall be made a part of 
Article — of this constitution, and not otherwise. 

2. Resolved, That the Committee on Schedule be and they 
are hereby instructed to report the necessary provisions for 
carrying the foregoing resolution into effect. 

This, it will be observed, was not a proposition to 
incorporate gradual emancipation in the constitution. It 
Avas only to let the people vote separately when they voted 
on the constitution whether they wanted such a provision 
put in. 

Mr. Battelle remarked that the convention could take 
whatever action in reference to these resolutions they 
might think proper. If they chose to make them the order 
of the day for any fixed future day, as an individual he 
did not care; but he supposed there were some gentlemen 
who would wish to discuss this matter, and thej- might 
proceed a while at least in that discussion. 

Mr. Sinsel moved to make the resolutions the order 
for next morning at ten o'clock. 

CONVENTION WILL NOT HAVE IT. 

Mr. Hall, of Marion: I move to amend the motion by mov- 
ing to lay on the table. 

Mr. Battelle: I sincerely hope that this Convention will 
not. I hope that no such gag rule will be instituted here in 
this Convention. 

Mr. Stuart, of Doddridge: That question is not debatable. 

Mr. Powell: On that question I ask the yeas and nays. 

Mr. Van Winkle: I understand that is a privileged motion, 
to lay on the table without day. That can be made without 
amendment. 



MAKIXG THE COXSTITUTIOX. 421 

The President: It is a substitute and will be voted on as 
such. 

Mr. Hail, of Marion: I design to make the motion merely to 
accomplish the object. 

The President: It will be regarded as a substitute. 

On the motion to thus lay on the table indefinitely the 
vote resulted: 

Yeas — Hall of Mason (President), Brown of Kanawha, 
Brumfield, Chapman, Carskadon, Bering, Dolly, Hall of Marion, 
Raymond, Harrison, Hubbs, Irvine, Lamb, Montague, Mc- 
Cutchen. Robinson, Ruffner, Sinsel, Stephenson of Clay, 
Stuart of Doddridge, Sheets, Smith, Van Winkle, and 
Warder— 24. 

Nays — Brown of Preston, Brooks, Battelle, Caldwell, Dille, 
Hervey, Hagar, Hoback, Lauck, Mahon, O'Brien, Parsons, Powell, 
Parker, Paxton, Pomeroy, Ryan, Simmons, Stevenson of Wood, 
Stewart of Wirt. Soper, Trainer and Wilson — 23. 

So the resolutions were laid on the table. 

POMEKOY TKIES TO KESUERECT. 

The following day, after reports on finance and county 
organization had been disposed of and sent to the Com- 
mittee on Revision, Mr. Pomeroy, of Hancock, suggested 
that as they now had nothing else before them the vexed 
question raised by the resolution offered the day before 
by Mr, Battelle "might be com^Dromised," either by adopt- 
ing a proposition already written out or by raising a 
committee of conference representing in about equal num- 
ber the opposing views, and let them bring in a report, 
either to adopt the first of the resolutions offered by the 
gentleman from Ohio and make that part of the constitu- 
tion without any separate vote by the jDCople or raise a 
committee of conference. 



422 THE RENDTXG OF VIRGINIA. 

I fully concur, Mr. Pomeroy continued, with the remarks of 
the gentleman from Logan in conversation on this subject that 
we ought all to desire a new State above everything else and take 
action which would meet not only the favor of the people but of 
Congress. I am not prepared to say, from the fact of this busi- 
ness being hurried through, which is the best manner to proceed. 
I cannot conceive any evil that could result from a committee 
of conference, as I understand they would certainly report in 
favor of the first of the resolutions offered by the gentleman 
from Ohio being incorporated in the constitution; which is that 
no free negro or slave after the adoption of the constitution 
should be imported for permanent residence. So many gentle- 
men say they would agree to that there could be no difficulty in 
the committee of conference, for they would certainly report that 
part and then might take into consideration the other part. 
I cannot conceive if the committee would meet in the right spirit 
any evil would result, and if so it would be my idea to raise the 
committee now. 

SMITH WANTS "COMPROMISE" BUT NO "EXCITEMENT." 

Mr. Smith, of Logan: If there is a proposition of this sort 
proposed I would like for it to be read and if it meets our 
approbation, I would like for it to be adopted at once without 
a committee of conference if it can be. If it is thought prob- 
able it will not be, let us refer it to a committee of conference. 
But I would prefer the proposition being read as acceptable to 
myself and others who act with me. We may as well vote on it 
at once. I am willing, in a spirit of compromise, to concede 
anything I can properly concede; and I would prefer hearing 
the proposition that is proposed to be offered. I understand 
there is a gentleman who has a proposition, and I would like 
to have it read and then determine what to do with it. and if it 
is going to produce any excitement here I would prefer to have it 
sent to a committee of compromise. 

Mr. Battelle: I regret, for one, that this subject is named 
now. A gentleman on the other side came to see me this 
morning, and inquired whether this topic would probably be up 
this morning. I, of course, could not speak authoritatively but 
thought it would not; and I pledged him, so far as I was con- 
cerned, that there should be no action on this question in his 



MAKING THE CONSTITUTION. 423 

I 

I 
absence. I want no action here that shall be a vote one way or 
the other without the fair presence and concurrence of gentle- 
men interested in both ways. 1 want, if I am defeated in my 
particular opinions on this subject, to have it fairly done; and 
if I succeed in my views I wish it fairly done; and for that 
reason, especially that I pledged myself to the gentleman who 
is absent, that nothing should be done here without his pres- 
ence. I would regret that anything more be done at least than 
what was indicated by my friend from Hancock, the appoint- 
ment of the committee. I would not wish to go into the dis- 
cussion of the question in the absence of this gentleman. 

Mr. Bering: How would it do to make it an order of the 
day for three o'clock? 

Mr, Battelle: I suppose the appointment of a committee 
would be no infraction of that understanding? 

DILLE WOULD EXCLUDE NEGROES AS A "COMPROMISE." 

Mr. Dille: I have for some time had more trouble in refer- 
ence to this question than perhaps any other that might be 
brought up before this Convention in any manner; and I have 
felt that soihething like this provision would harmonize and 
conciliate and do everything consistent to bring about a perfect 
harmony upon this, of all others, the most vexed question in 
our country. And I suppose, really, that we ought in the spirit 
of compromise come to some definite conclusion without any 
discussion or agitation upon this subject. And I suggest this 
morning upon m^y own responsibility, without even consulting 
with the friends of the proposition that was laid on the table 
yesterday, to inquire of the mover whether the first clause of 
the proposition laid on the table yesterday would probably as 
a compromise be acceptable to those favoring the motion to 
lay the original proposition on the table. V/ith the frankness 
and good feeling characteristic of the gentleman from Logan, 
he intimated to me that he had no doubt the first clause would 
be acceptable to those entertaining views adverse to this pro- 
position. I then intimated and I am willing to say that if this 
Convention can be reconciled upon that first proposition, and 
that proposition can be inserted in the Constitution with the 
cordial approbation of the friends of the proposition and those 
who may be adverse to the whole proposition, that I think we 



424: THE EENDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

ought to accept it. I lock upon a new State in West Virginia 
as a matter above and higher than all other considerations com 
bined; and I think we bring about a state of feeling that will 
contribute more to the success — that will concede to the feel- 
ings and prejudices of our people and to the feelings and pre- 
judices of those to whom we must look if we expect admission 
as a State into the Union. And if I can have the assurance that 
that proposition will meet with the approbation of this Conven- 
tion, it will afford me great pleasure to present it; and having 
been accepted by those who oppose the whole proposition, I will 
say to them that as one individual I will oppose any action be- 
ing taken on the latter clause of the proposition. I think it is 
right; I think it is due *^o members of the Convention, that we 
should make mutual concessions on this subject. 

POilEROY FOR A COXFEREXCE. 

Mr. Pomeroy: I will now move, to test the sense of the 
house, as there are a number of gentlemen present on both 
sides, that a committee of eight be appointed. I see no evil that 
can result from this committee of conference. They would cer- 
tainly report on the first part. Whether they do or not, it will 
be open to the Convention afterwards. And I want to say, Mr. 
President, that I hope all these things will be met in a spirit 
cf conciliation and good feeling — no undue excitement on this 
subjeci. at all. The committee will certainly report this first 
proposition, which the gentleman from Preston says he is in 
favor of; and I also am favorable to it, because we do not want 
any free negroes here. 

BROWN OF KANAWHA DELIGHTED WITH DILLE'S "COMPROJIISE." 

Mr. Brown of Kanawha: I have just learned definitely of 
the proposition of the gentleman from Preston and his declara- 
tion; and I am very ready to say that I will meet him half-way 
with the right-hand of fellowship and adopt his proposition at 
once as a full settlement of this matter. And I believe, sir, it 
will give peace and quiet to our people; it will do justice to all. 
and it will compromise the rights of none; and when so great 
and good an object can be done, I shall be one of the first to 
accept and sustain it. I hope it will be the pleasure of every 
gentleman in the house to do the same thing. 



MAKING THE C0IS"STITUTI02f. 425 

Mr. Caldwell: I hope after the remarks we have all heard 
from my friend from Kanawha County that the gentleman from 
Hancock will see the impropriety of prolonging this matter any 
further and of the absence of any necessity for appointing a 
committee. I think this house now is in a position in which 
this proposition can be adopted, calmly and coolly, and almost 
unanimously adopted; and I hope my friend from Hancock will 
withdraw his motion for a committee, and I trust we will pass 
it unanimously. 

Mr. Hervey: I am very much pleased to hear the proposi- 
tion made by the gentleman from Preston. I have had some 
conference with a number of gentlemen who opposed the motion 
to lay on the table yesterday. We have great confidence in the 
discretion and forecast of the gentleman from Preston, and I 
confess, sir, that I have no fears at all. I believe it is bound to 
be a free State; and I have no doubt that as this seems to be 
the only exception by the persons from both sides that we bet- 
ter just vote that proposition as it stands without the committee. 

A member asked what the precise proposition was. 
The Secretary reported the first clause of Mr. Battelle's 
proposition as follows: 

"No slave shall be brought or free person of color come into 
this State for permanent residence after this constitution goes 
Into operation." 

Mr. Dille: I hope it will be the pleasure of the gentleman 
from Hancock to withdraw his proposition. And I hope further, 
with the feeling that I see around me on this subject that this 
proposition may be inserted in the constitution by an unanimous 
vote. I do not want a dissenting voice on that subject; and I 
want the whole matter to end there. I think we might spare a 
good day's work and a day's work that will tell upon the future 
of the new State of West Virginia. 

PRESIDEXT HALL .\PPROVES. 

The President: The chair is of the opinion that if the dis- 
position to compromise this question exists in the Convention — 
and it seems to exist there — that it would be certainly inadvis- 
able to appoint a committee; that after what has occun-ed, it 



426 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

might carry the idea abroad that there was a division here; 
that what we did we were forced to do through a committee of 
compromise. The chair would therefore suggest to the Con- 
vention that if there is that unanimity which the chair hopes 
there is, then it is better to dispense with the committee. 

Mr. Pomeroy: The mover of the motion will very cordially 
withdraw it if the Convention is ready to vote. I can very 
cordially vote for that proposition and I thought the committee 
could do no harm. 

BATTELLE PREFERS A CONFERENCE. 

Mr. Battelle: I wish to say at this point that in view of 
the considerations before stated by myself I should prefer that 
action be not taken this morning on this question; and if any- 
thing is done I should prefer the direction intimated by the 
gentleman from Hancock. As I said before, I know there are 
gentlemen absent on both sides of this question, but I speak 
especially of gentlemen I know to be absent on the other side 
who before leaving came to me and intimated their desire that 
the question be not brought up this morning. As far as I am 
personally concerned, I expressed my own preference that It 
should not come up, and that if it did they should be notified 
thereof. I feel that my honor is involved in this point; and if 
the question is to come up for final action here, it is but right 
that they should be present. I will add, further, that personally 
I would prefer to have more time for i-eflection on this subject. 
The idea of incorporating this single provision is a new propo- 
sition to me, and I do not think it can interfere with the 
harmony and good feeling that prevails here this morning to 
either refer or allow the vote to be taken to-morrow morning. 
, I should prefer that direction to the taking of the vote now. 
and I think it would be the fairest on all sides if we could un- 
derstand it that the vote was to be taken then and everybody 
could be present. 

Mr. Raymond: I am in hopes the gentleman from Han- 
cock will withdraw. I think the resolution of the gentleman 
from Preston is the very thing, sir, that I wanted when I came 
here. 

The President: The gentleman has withdrawn his motion. 

Mr. Stevenson of Wood: I was going to make this sugges- 
tion — or if necessary make a motion — as there are a number 



MAKIXt; THE CONSTITUTION^. 427 

of gentlemeu absent on both sides of this question, that they 
should have an opportunity of recording their votes on this sub- 
ject if they thought proper, either to-day or to-morrow. 

Several Members: Certainly. 

The President: It will be considered as the sense of the 
Convention. 

Mr. Pomeroy: I hope it will be the unanimous consent of 
the Convention that the vote be recorded on this, the yeas and 
nays. 

Mr. Parker: If I understand, this is on the first clause. 

The Secretary read the first clause of the propositions 
submitted yesterday by Mr. Battelle. 

PARKER HAS HIS DOUBTS. 

Mr. Parker: No one would be more gratified than myself 
if the whole question could be entirely ignored. The only ques- 
tion in my mind — and the question has been there for some 
time is whether we can get through Congress — whether we can 
consummate our end. If we could do this without touching the 
question at all, it is my desire and has been all the time. Now 
the question arises in my mind whether the adoption of what 
now seems to be pretty generally conceded — if that is to be satis- 
factory and enough, I am for it — that is, if it is necessary. But 
whether it goes far enough to meet what will be necessary, to 
ensure us admission — the approval of Congress and admission 
• — that is the question. And it is a vital question, it seems to 
me. I would therefore, Mr. President — because I don't believe 
discussion on a question of this kind is going to do any good — 
I should hope that the matter might be referred to a committee 
fairly representing both parties here — say of eight — and that 
they investigate the whole matter and report what in their 
judgment the Convention ought to do to secure us success. Be- 
cause unless we meet with that success there, why then the 
whole thing here is a stupendous and expensive abortion, not 
to say disgrace; and its projectors and conductors, including 
ourselves, would be the object of universal derision. 

The President: The question is a plain one. Everybody 
seems to have made up their minds. The object of the Con- 
vention is to avoid discussion as far as possible. 



428 THE EENDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

Mr. Stuart of Doddridge (who had just come in): When i 
vote on this, do I understand that I am voting on it as a com- 
promise measure, and as settling the question? 

A Member: Yes, sir. 

Mr. Stuart of Doddridge: Then, sir, I do not want to say 
one word. 

BATTELLE ENTERS INTO NO "COMPROMISE." 

Mr. Battelle: The gentleman from Doddridge is now in, 
and I wish the Convention to bear me witness that the coming 
up of this question now is not by my act and that I have re- 
deemed in good faith the promise I made him this morning. 
I much prefer that this question should not be considered now 
and especially after the intimations given to it. 

And I wish here to say that so far as I am concerned, as an 
individual, I enter into no arrangement with regard to compro- 
mises in this fashion. I expect to vote for what suits me and 
to vote against what I dislike. I should much prefer if the 
question did not come up this morning and was willing, so far 
as 1 regarded it as violating no understanding with individual 
members — if it did come up at all, that it be referred to a com- 
mittee such as indicated by the gentleman from Hancock, of four 
persons on each side. I should feel myself, if voting for that 
proposition, bound to at least pay very respectful attention to 
their report whatever it might be. 1 am prepared to vote for 
the pending proposition in good faith; but I wish to say in 
answer to the question of the gentleman from Doddridge that 
on my part I do not enter into this arrangement as a matter 
of compromise; because there has been no arrangement which 
could give it the dignity of a compromise: I mean no such 
parliamentary arrangement, for instance, as its reference to a 
committee. 

And I will say, sir, with the indulgence of the Convention 
while on the floor— and that is the crowning motive impelling 
me as an individual in all this business — that we should have 
a new State; and I desire to see such action taken as will most 
effectually secure that end. I have not had time for reflection 
to determine in my own mind how far it will go towards secur- 
ing that end. I should have preferred, if the question must be 



^[AKING THE CONSTITUTION. 429 

mooted to-day at all, that it be referred to a committee fairly 
and properly constituted of gentlemen of different views, that 
they might report to us to-morrow morning. 

The question was taken on the motion to incorporate 
the first proposition in the constitution and it was agreed 
to, with a single dissenting vote, that of Mr. Brumfield. 

DID HIS OWN" VOTING. 

Several members appealed to Mr. Brumfield to change 
his vote and make it unanimous. 

Mr. Brumfield replied that he didn't "take as much 
part in the discussions as some of the members," but he 
always ''did his own voting." 

The members absent when the vote was taken were: 
Paxton, Mahoii, Willey and Walker. 

HAYMOND didn't REFLECT. 

Mr. Haymond: I congratulate this house and the country 
on the vote just taken. If nothing more is said about slavery 
here, it will do more than anything this house can do to cause 
all opposition to this Constitution and this New State to cease. 
And I ask my friend from Ohio (Mr. Battelle) never to mention 
slavery here again. 

Mr. Dering moved to adjourn, 

Mr. Battelle: Will the gentleman withdraw his motion a 
moment? 

Mr. Dering: Certainly. 

Mr. Battelle: Indulge me a moment while I say that I join 
in the congratulations of my friend from Marion; except in so 
far — which I suppose he did not intend — as his remarks imply 
any reflection on me individually for mooting a subject here 



430 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

which in my judgment as a representative in this Convention I 
see proper to moot. I hope, however, the gentleman intends no 
reflection on me personally. 

Mr. Raymond : I intended nothing of the sort. 

PERVERSION OF HISTORY. 

In the "Sketch of the Formation of West Virginia" 
prefixed to Vol. I West Virginia Supreme Court Reports 
appears the following: 

On the 14tn of December, Mr. Battelle, a delegate from Ohio 
County offered a series of propositions designed to be engrafted 
into the Constitution in relation to African slavery that brought 
about great debate, which happily was sustained in a spirit of 
fairness and candor not always hitherto the accompaniment of 
the investigation of that singularly perplexing subject. * * * 
After a prolonged struggle, the propositions were defeated by a 
majority of one. 

In the foregoing pages is given a verbatim report of all 
that was said and done in regard to Mr. Battelle's proposi- 
tions. The debate could hardly be described as "great," 
nor the struggle as "prolonged." The prompt applica- 
tion of the gag forbade debate and cut short the struggle. 

FORFEITED LANDS RELEASED. 

The last subject to receive the attention of the Con- 
vention was wild lands, lying chiefly in the more moun- 
tainous and southern districts. Under the Virginia sys- 
tem these lands had been subject to entry by warrants 
sold at two cents per acre. The great body of them had 
long been held by speculators, who carried them along 
from year to year, or from decade to decade, and took ad- 
vantage of every loophole in the laws to postpone or evade 



MAKING THE CONSTITUTION. 431 

the payment of the trifling taxes levied on them, the com- 
monest trick being to neglect to have them entered on the 
land books so the taxes could be charged against them. 
It appears large areas of these lands forfeited to the State 
prior to 1832 were by legislative act in that year exoner- 
ated; and it appears also that through carelessness or 
intentional fraud many of these same lands were carried 
along for the succeeding twenty years in the same way. 
In April, 1852, an act was passed giving the owners until 
the first of July, 1853, to pay up, and forfeiting all lands 
not so paid for. Thus some lands were twice forfeited, 
in 1831 and again in 1853. 



SCHOOLS AEE THE LOSEKS. 

The first proposition to deal with these lands in the 
Convention was submitted by Mr. Battelle in his report 
of provisions for the chapter on schools. He proposed to 
create a permanent school fund, for which he expected to 
get large accretions from sale of these forfeited lands. He 
proposed that all lands within the Xew State which had 
not been entered for taxation or upon which taxes had not 
been paid to the State of Virginia or West Virginia for a 
period exceeding five years should be "deemed and de- 
clared forfeited and forever irredeemable," and such for- 
feiture should not be released. This drag-net would have 
caught all the lands given away by the State (two cents 
an acre was giving away) to persons who had twice for- 
feited all right to them by either inexcusable carelessness 
or intentional dishonesty. Three days after this Mr. 
Smith of Logan proposed a substitute the effect of which 



432 THE RENDING OF VIEGINIA. 

was to simply confirm the forfeitures in 1831, This was 
adopted. Some days later Mr, Brown of Kanawha offered 
a provision (also adopted) that ''all lauds vested in the 
State of Virginia may be redeemed by the former owner 
within five years after this Constitution goes into opera- 
tion." This appeared to annul even the forfeiture pro- 
posed by Mr. Smith. Then the whole subject was re- 
ferred to a special committee of which Mr. Harrison of 
Harrison was chairman, and the provisions reported by 
them were embodied in the constitution. These were in 
effect (1st) that the Legislature should provide for the 
sale of lands heretofore forfeited to the State of Virginia 
for failure to pay taxes charged, or for non-entry on the 
books, for the year 1831 or any previous year; (2) that 
lands returned delinquent and lands forfeited for non- 
entry, since 1831, where the taxes did not exceed $20, and 
tracts did not exceed 1,000 acres, were released and exon- 
erated from forfeiture and delinquent taxes; (3rd) that 
lands theretofore vested in the State of Virginia by for- 
feiture or by purchase at sheriff's sale for delinquent 
taxes, and not released or exonerated by the laws of Vir- 
ginia or under provisions of the 2nd clause preceding, 
could be redeemed within five years after the constitution 
became operative. These provisions, it will be seen, pro- 
vided avenues through which about all these forfeited 
lands could be given back to the persons who had carried 
them thirty years without any payment of taxes, except 
where the tracts were larger than 1,000 acres and the taxes 
more than $20. It was even provided that where any for- 
feitures did occur and the lands were sold, all excess of the 
sale over the taxes, damages and costs should go back to the 



MAKI]N^G THE CONSTITUTION. 433 

former owner. Thus it appears was lost to the schools 
nearly all of the munificent endowment Mr. Battelle had 
expected to secure from this source. 

PARKER SAYS DISCRIMINATION. 

The subject was one about which most members of the 
Convention except lawyers knew little. Mr. Parker of 
Cabell opjDOsed the conclusions of the committee. He 
contended that where forfeitures had accrued under the 
legislation of Virginia, the title had been vested in that 
State and this Convention had no power to deal with such 
cases; that if in the face of this lack of authority the 
Convention should attempt to dispossess the State of these 
lands and give them back to the former owners, West Vir- 
ginia would have' to account for them to Virginia in the 
settlement between the two States. He complained also 
of the discrimination in releasing tracts under 1,000 acres 
where taxes did not exceed $20 and not releasing the 
larger tracts. The larger tracts, he said, generally be- 
longed to non-resident owners ; the smaller to persons 
nearly all of whom were at that time engaged in the Re- 
bellion. The August ordinance had forbidden discrimina- 
tion against non-residents in the matter of taxation, and 
this was a violation of that injunction. He protested 
against the scheme brought in by the committee as doing 
what the Convention had no power to do ; "and if it had 
the power," he said, "the exercise of it in the manner 
proposed would be in the highest degree iniquitous and 
unjust." Mr. Parker was the agent for large landed in- 
terests belonging to non-resident owners. While the fact 

Va.-28 



13-1: THE RE.NmjvfG OF VIRGINIA. 

may be held to impeach his disinterestedness, it does not 
necessarily impeach the truth or justice of his position. 
His relation to the subject had obliged him to make him- 
self familiar with it and enabled him to see the opera- 
tion of what was proposed, while others who had not 
made special study of the subject could not trace its in- 
tricacies. 

A ZEALOUS ATTORNEY. 

The member who appeared to be most zealous and 
most influential in shaping the action of the Conven- 
tion in this matter was Col. Benjamin H. Smith, dele- 
gate from Logan. Colonel Smith was a resident of 
Charleston, and at that time U. S. District Attorney, a 
lawyer of ability and experience, and perhaps more 
familiar with the subject of Virginia wild lands than 
any other member of the Convention. He had been 
])ermitted to come in upon a petition signed by fifteen 
refugees, claiming to be from Logan County, who were 
at Camp Piatt, the headquarters of the -iith Ohio Kegi- 
ment. 

Several other members of the Convention held seats 
by credentials quite as slender as these, but none of them 
attempted to exercise such a controlling influence as 
Colonel Smith, He did not come into the Convention 
till late in the session, and all appearances indicated that 
he had sought admission to a seat only because of his 
interest in this subject. 



THE CONSTITUTIOX, AS MADE. 435 

THE COi^STITUTION. 

It would exceed the limits set for this work to attempt 
even the briefest synopsis of all the debates in this Con- 
vention. The first sitting lasted eighty-five days. There 
were fluent talkers — and a few really able ones — among 
the members; a few broad-gauge, liberal-minded men, 
familiar and in sympathy with the best thought and pur- 
j)ose of the time; and such is the might of intelligence 
and of o]3en, straightforward purpose that they, despite 
the narro-uTiess, ig-norance, pro-slavery virus and old-Yir- 
giniaisms of all kinds in the Convention, gave direction 
and in the main final shape to the instrument produced. 

The loyalty of the State was declared in the first sec- 
tion of the first article: "The State of West Virginia 
shall be and remain one of the United States of America." 
The Virginia bill of rights was incorporated with its 
guaranties of religious liberty and freedom of speech and 
ju'ess ; security of the citizen in his home ; admission of 
the truth in the absence of malice as justification in de- 
fence of suits for libel. "Treason against the State" was 
recognized, punishment to be fixed by statute. The three 
dejDartments of government — legislative, executive and ju- 
dicial, were required to be separate, neither to exercise the 
powers of another, nor any person invested with the jdow- 
ers of two at the same time. Mr. Jefferson, the most 
eminent of all Virginia law-givers, it may be remarked, 
Avas so scrupulous about the observance of the separation 
of these three departments of government that when he 
became vice-president he declined to take part, as had 
been the custom down to that time, in the deliberations 



436 THE RENDING OF VIEGINIA. 

of the cabinet, on the ground that he belonged to the legis- 
lative and had no right to participate in the executive 
functions. In that period, fresh from constitutional 
studies, public men gave much more consideration to this 
demarkation than now. Montesquieu ascribed the merits 
of the English constitution to its sejjaration of these three 
functions, and no one principle, as essential to freedom, 
took such hold on the builders of our National Constitu- 
tion. Mr. Jefferson regarded the concentration of these 
powers in the same hands as "the precise definition of 
despotism." Suffrage was limited to the ''white male" 
citizens and a capitation of $1 required. The voting was 
to be by secret ballot and there was to be a registry of 
voters. There was to be no grant for extra compensation 
after work was done ; dueling was punished by disability 
to hold office. Legislature to meet annually; sessions 
limited ordinarily to 45 days ; members to receive $3 per 
day and 10 cents a mile; bills to be read on three separate 
da^'s except in emergency. Governor's term to be two 
years, salary $2,000; other State officers: Secretary of 
State, Treasurer, Auditor and Attorney General. Ju- 
diciary to consist of circuit courts and Supreme Court ; 
the latter to consist of three judges, at salary of $2,000 
and term of twelve years. County officers to be : Sheriff, 
prosecuting attorney, surveyor, recorder and assessors. 
Civil jurisdiction of justices limited to $100. ^o county 
to have less than four hundred square miles area. Tax- 
ation to be "equal and uniform, all property, real and 
personal, to be taxed in jDroportion to its value" and "no 
one species of property to be taxed higher than any other 
of equal value." Creation of State debt forbidden, ex- 



THE CONSTITUTION, AS MADE. 437 

cept to meet casual deficits in revenue, to redeem a pre- 
vious liabilitv, suppress insurrection, repel invasion or 
defend the State in time of war. Credit of the State not 
to he granted to or in aid of any county, city, town, town- 
ship, corporation or person, nor the State to become re- 
sponsible for the debts or liabilities of such unless in- 
curred in time of war for the benefit of the State. An 
"equitable proportion" of the Virginia debt prior to Jan- 
uary 1, 1861, to be assumed, the Legislature to ascertain 
the same as soon as practicable and provide for its liquida- 
tion by a sinking-fund. 

A general school fund was created from accretions 
to the State from sales of "forfeited, delinquent, waste and 
unappropriated lands;" from grants, devises or bequests 
to the State ; from the State's share of the literary fund of 
Virginia ; from money, stocks or property which the State 
had a right to claim from Virginia for educational pur- 
poses ; proceeds of estates where there was no will or heir ; 
escheated lands; taxes levied on the revenues of corpora- 
•tions ; moneys paid as exemption from military duty, and 
any appropriations to the fund which might be made by 
the Lesrislature. This fund was to be invested as it accrued 
and the interest only used to supplement local levies. The 
Legislature Avas required to provide for a thorough sys- 
tem of free common schools, with a State superintendent 
and county superintendents. Out of these provisions has 
grown a large permanent fund, for which the State has 
largely to thank Gordon Battelle, chairman of the Com- 
mittee on Education. If Mr. Battelle could have had his 
wish, the school legacy of West Virginia would have been 
much larger. 



438 THE KENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

Lotteries were forbidden, as was" also the incorpora- 
tion of any church or religious denomination. Circuit 
courts were allowed to grant divorces, change names and 
direct sales of the estates of minor or other incapable heirs. 
The Legislature might prohibit the traffic in intoxicating 
liquors; and it was required to provide by general laws 
for the creation of corporations. All special legislation 
was prohibited. Persons of color, slave or free, were for- 
bidden to come into the State for permanent residence 
(but this provision was eliminated at the recalled session 
on requirement of Congress). 

In the discussion on county organization, Mr. Van 
Winkle had quoted Jefferson, who declared : ''Those 
wards, called townshij^s in Xew England, are the vital 
l^rinciple of their governments and have proved themselves 
the wisest invention ever devised by the wit of man for 
the perfect exercise of self-government and for its preser- 
vation." The township system was adopted, the town 
supervisors to constitute the county fiscal board. This 
board, unlike the old Virginia "county court," was to ex- 
ercise no judicial functions. A sufficiency of courts was 
provided for, and the county board of supervisors was to 
attend to fiscal business and exercise legislative functions 
only. 

The one serious mistake in this constitution was in not 
providing for the early extinguishment of slavery. But 
the influence of the institution upon the minds of even 
liberal and intelligent men — as if it were an enshrined 
divinity in some "forbidden city," not to be touched by 
profane hands and to be spoken of only with bated breath 
— was one of the j)henomena of the time. 



THE LEGISLATURE CONSENTS. 439 

The schedule provided for snhmitting" the constitution 
to the people on the fourth Thursday in xlpril. The com- 
missioners were to certify the result to the Governor ; and 
if the constitution should be adopted by the people, he 
was requested to lay the result before the Legislature and 
ask that body to consent to the separation ; and to forward 
the evidence of such consent, if given, to the Congress of 
the United States, accomj)anicd by an official copy of the 
constitution, with request that West Virginia be admit- 
ted as -a State into the Union. 

CONSTITUTION ADOPTED. 

The vote on the constitution was 18,862 for and 514 
against. The friends of a free State, under lead of the 
Intelligencer, disapjDointed by the refusal of the Conven- 
tion to submit Mr. Battelle's emancipation proposition, 
advised the taking of an informal vote on the same, and 
in a number of counties this was done. The aggregate 
of the vote cast in this irregiilar and unauthorized way 
was over six thousand in favor of emancipation to a little 
over six hundred against it — ten to one. This was a sur- 
prising expression in view of the difficulties under which 
it was obtained. 

LEGISLATURE CONSENTS TO DIVISION. 

The General Assembly met May 6th, in response to 
call from the Governor; and on the 13th gave the formal 
consent of Virginia to the formation of the new State; 
and a certified copy of the formal consent, with a certi- 
fied copy of the constitution, was forwarded to Washing- 
ton and placed in the hands of Senator Willey. 



CHAPTER XVI. 

BATTELLE'S MASTERLY PLEA FOR A FREE STATE. 

ADDRESSES A WIDER AUDIENCE. 

Gordon Battelle, denied the right of uttering his 
thoughts regarding slavery on the floor of the Convention, 
appealed to the palladium of modern liberty, printers' 
ink. He printed in pamphlet the address he had intended 
to deliver and scattered it throughout the counties of 
Northwest Virginia. It is an utterance that deserves a 
place in the permanent historical literature of West Vir- 
ginia. It seems to me the ablest and completest presenta- 
tion of the question as it then existed west of the moun- 
tains ever put on paper. Its logic is irrefutable ; its 
pathos, its eloquence, its appeals to all the better motives 
and purposes which could animate men laying the founda- 
tion of a commonwealth, are irresistible. 



* * * Why is not the temperate and free discussion of this 
question perfectly legitimate to this time, and to the purposes 
for which this body has been convened? We are met here by 
the will of our constituents, as a free Convention — (excuse me, 
sir, that I do not say a sovereign Convention, a designation which 
the events of the last few months have led some of us to most 

440 



BATTELLE S PLEA FOR A FREE STATE. 



441 




Gordon Battelle. 



heartily distrust) — to form and propose a fundamental law for 
the adoption or rejection of the people of the proposed new 
State of West Virginia. It is simply meeting the just and 
reasonable expectations of the people, that we have already con- 
sidered, or that we shall hereafter fully discuss, all the depart- 
ments and agencies of government, as well as the various in- 
terests and objects upon which that government acts. Every 
institution and interest of the people, that is now or that is 
likely to become the subject of law, is, as I suppose, by the very 
power that brought us here, placed fully before us for our ex- 
amination and action. That the institution of slavery, as it 
exists in our bounds, is the mere creature of law; and that as 
law creates it, law is competent to remove it, and that, there- 
fore, it is fairly and properly a subject for our consideration, is 
so plain a proposition, that I think none will deny it. Let it be 
observed that I am not now discussing the question. What shall 



442 THE KENDIXG OF VIKGINIA. 

we do with this interest? but the prior question. Is it a proper 
subject for our inquiries? It strikes me there can be but one 
answer. 

And let it further be borne in mind, that it is not proposed 
that we sit in judgment on the affairs of our neighbors. We are 
not invited to waste our time in idle criticisms upon the local 
concerns of either Georgia or Maine. Of the unprofitableness, 
to say the least, of all such misguided effort, no one has more 
decided convictions, or has expressed them more emphatically 
than myself. But the thing now proposed is, that the people of 
West Virginia, in reference to an institution completely and ab- 
solutely their own — existing on their own soil — deriving its 
very breath from their own laws, and only from thence — shall, 
through their representatives here met, look that institution 
squarely and firmly in the face; that they shall treat it with 
the same freedom, no more and no less, with which they con- 
sider every other interest of the people — that they shall ex- 
amine it, regulate it, if it needs regulating; confirm it, if it 
needs confirming; or abate it, if it needs abating, accomplishing 
in short, a duty which they are not only competent to perform, 
but which, in some of its fundamental aspects, there is abso- 
lutely no other assembly on earth that has the power to touch. 
I need scarcely add, in a presence like this, that our organic 
and statute laws bear witness on many an ample page that this 
question, not only of competency, but of propriety, has long 
since been settled beyond dispute. 

And why should it not be thus? You propose, and most 
properly, after the most thorough and unflinching scrutiny, to 
freely pass upon the claims of capital and credit, banks and 
highways, taxation and representation, lotteries and duels, mar- 
riage and divorce, corporations and schools, upon every ques- 
tion, in short involving the rights of either persons or things, 
v/ithin the limits of what we all hope with the blessing of God, 
is to become a prosperous and renowned Commonwealth. Why 
should this question, involving the interests and rights of la- 
bor — its very status indeed — more fundamental than any of 
them, be of them all, alone ignored? You propose in reference 
to other questions, to have a clearly defined policy. Why shall 
this one upon which all others depend, alone be doomed to un- 
certainty and peril? 



battelle's plea foe a feee state. 4-1:3 

I wish to offer one other preliminary remark. — It is quite 
certain that first and last, some very unwise and untimely words 
have been uttered, and acts performed, by outside parties in 
reference to our system, that had better on every account re- 
mained unsaid and undone. What then? Because others to 
whom our domestic affairs do not belong have sought, offensively 
it may be, to meddle with them, shall we to whom they do be- 
long refuse a just attention to them? It is all very easy to say 
chat if people elsewhere had not acted extravagantly Virginia 
would have freed herself thirty years ago from this burthen. 
But what shall we say on the other hand of the statemanship 
of those of our own rulers, who, with a system directly and 
continually under their own eye — admitted by themselves to be 
injurious to the State — have, because great folly existed some- 
where else, not only permitted but carefully encouraged that 
system to strengthen with its growth, until it has well nigh 
plunged a whole commonwealth from seaboard to river, in irre- 
trievable ruin! It were very childish certainly, and in that 
sense but natural perhaps to follow the example of the ostrich, 
which when pursued by its foes, sticks its head in the sand so 
that it cannot see the danger to which it is thereby all the more 
exposed. But is it manly, is it wise thus to act? Is there a 
man among us that does not believe, that had this State at the 
time alluded to, firmly and wisely met this issue, not only would 
she now have been abreast of her neighbors in the race for pros- 
perity, but this blasting, desolating war would have never 
entered her borders. 

Let it further be observed that it is not proposed by any 
thing before us to interfere in any shape with any existing 
relation or right. — Where the relation of master and servant 
exists among us it will, for any thing here proposed, still con- 
tinue, and so continuing it ought to be, and no doubt will be, 
protected by sufficient laws. The proposed measure has in it 
nothing violent, sudden or rash. Its friends are not tenacious 
of particular phrases, or forms or dates; but they do urge, as 
both fundamental and vital to the success of the new State, that 
it shall now be settled in our organic law, that at some reason- 
able, fixed though future time, this weight upon our energies 
shall begin its gradual but certain disappearance. 



444 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

I propose to consider this question first and briefly as a 
matter of principle; and then as a matter of expediency. The 
system of slavery, as exhibited in our laws, is wrong in itself. 
Any candid observer will not fail to discriminate between the 
system and the acts of the individual. The one is always bad; 
the other may not only be innocent but oftentimes is so. I 
shall indulge in no harsh terms concerning the system as thus 
shown; but I state certainly no more than the plain truth when 
I say that it cannot be reconciled with the obvious requirements 
of either justice or morals. 

I have already endeavored to discriminate between our sys- 
tem of slavery as gathered from our laws, and the acts of the 
individual citizen. My acquaintance with many of the slave 
owners of West Virginia leads me to still further emphasise that 
discrimination. Many of them I know to be just and humane — 
not in consequence of the system, but in spite of it. Men who, 
though placed by circumstances in contact with a bad law, them- 
selves are governed by a better rule; men who are every way 
better than the system, and who have steadfastly resisted the 
temptations to avarice and power, which it has constantly pre- 
sented to them; who, as masters, parents and citizens, have 
given examples of virtue worthy of the imitation of us all, and 
who, in this the hour of their country's great peril, have un- 
waveringly stood up for that country's honor and flag. I am 
proud to-day to have had the privilege of numbering some of 
these — from among the living and the dead — among my most 
valued friends. And I say further — and let the Convention 
mark what I am about to assert — that if the proposition now 
urged is submitted to the people, some of these very men will 
not only vote for it, but they will be among its most effective 
supporters. They will see in the measure that which, while it 
interferes with no existing right or relation, not only gradually 
and safely settles a disturbing question, but that which im- 
measurably advances their own prosperity by securing that of 
the community of which they are members. But waiving this 
inquiry the point of present interest is the fact that the law — 
the system itself, and it is of that I speak, is bad; that it pre- 
sents to the community, with all the sanctions of the public 
authority, a false principle; and as such, it ought to be in some 
wise and safe way, abated. 



battelle's plea foe a free state. 445 

I shall offer no apology in a body like this for inviting at- 
tention to this aspect of this question. What is right, or what 
is wrong, is as I suppose, precisely one of the questions that 
every man here asks or should ask himself, in every vote he 
gives, and in every act he performs. Who will say that it shall 
be disregarded only in the case of those who by no possibility, 
can ever make here, a vocal or personal appeal? But if it could 
be presumed that we may ignore this principle in this direction 
of it, dare we do so, in the direction of our own people, who, it 
may safely be affirmed, have been and are after all, by far the 
greater sufferers, by the wrong which this system embodies. 
The injuries which it inflicts upon our own people are mani- 
fold and obvious. It practically aims to enslave not merely an- 
other race, but our own race. It inserts in its bill of rights 
some very high sounding phrases securing the freedom of 
speech; and then practically and in detail puts a lock on every 
man's mouth and a seal on every man's lips who will not shout 
for and swear by the divinity of the system. It amuses the 
popular fancy with a few glittering generalities in the funda- 
mental law about the liberty of the press, and forthwith usurps 
authority, even in times of peace, to send out its edict to every 
postmaster, whether in the village or at the cross roads, cloth- 
ing him with a despotic and absolute censorship over one of the 
dearest rights of the citizen. It degrades labor by giving it the 
badge of servility; and it impedes enterprise by withholding 
its proper rewards. It alone has claimed exemption from the 
rule of uniform taxation; and then demanded and received the 
largest share of the proceeds of that taxation. Is it any wonder 
in such a state of facts, that there are this day, of those who 
have been driven from Virginia, mainly by this system, men 
enough with their descendants, and means and energy, scattered 
through the West, of themselves, to make no mean State? 

But another and a deeper injury which this system inflicts 
upon our people, is in its swift tendency to pervert the popular 
mind. It cannot have escaped the observation of any one here, 
that law — civil law, whether fundamental or statute — is one of- 
the most potent educators of the people, whether for good or 
ill. It addresses and demands obedience of every citizen. The 
work which we and those other tribunals which we shall call 
into being, will perform, will be as ubiquitous as the light 



446 THE BENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

throughout the new Commonwealth, ruling in the business of 
the people; presiding unseen, it may be, but still potentially 
present, in their social intercourse; coloring and fashioning 
their very thoughts; and holding in its hands their fortunes and 
their lives. It will be, in a word, the law of the land, and as 
such it will, in some shape or other, visit every dwelling, and 
come home to every bosom. What we do hei'e will be the rule, 
not only of practice, but of principle to thousands, may I not 
say millions yet to come. — Shall we not see to it, that that rule, 
neither by its utterances, nor by an equally expressive silence, 
shall not tender to the people, with all the solemn sanctions of 
the public authority, some deadly error that shall poison at its 
very fountain, the life blood of the State. 

We have all listened here to the occasional and incidental, 
but most touching recitals of the delusions into which masses 
of our people have fallen, who are involved in the meshes of this 
terrible rebellion. I will not say that these extenuations as 
thus uttered, do not do honor to the heads and hearts of gentle- 
men conceiving them. But what has caused these blinding de- 
lusions? God help us all! for I fear that none of us is wholly in- 
nocent in this business. Our own slave code — organic and 
statute, written and unwritten — has furnished the fruitful soil 
whence has sprung full armed — perjury and rebellion, and 
treason and war. I have somewhere heard the story of a watch, 
most elaborately and artistically fashioned, which should have 
gone always right, but which did go always wrong. It was ex- 
amined and re-examined and re-adjusted, with the same result, 
until a magnet M^as discovered near the balance wheel, which 
disturbed its every motion. This removed, all worked well. 
Our old system, if left unrestricted in the new State machinery, 
will prove in the future, as in the past, the effectual disturber 
of its action. 

I know very -well that sentiments such as these have not 
been often heard, of late, in Constitutional Conventions of this 
State. But I know as well, that they have been heard in 
Virginia's purest days, and from the lips of Virginia's most 
eminent sons; and I but repeat as a learner, the lessons they 
have taught me. Beginning with Washington — continuing with 
Jefferson, Madison, Henry, and a host of others in that unrivalled 
galaxy of names, — disapprovals of the system as a question of 



battelle's plea fok a free state. 44:7 

principle, as well as on political grounds, everywhere abound. 
And I may say further, that up to a comparatively recent period, 
not a single utterance can be found from any prominent Ameri- 
can statesman^ South or North, which in substance differs from 
this testimony. Nor has the old voice lacked a response, even in 
later times. The most eminent citizen of "Virginia birth, since 
the former period — the echoes of whose voice still linger in the 
vallies of his own adopted Kentucky, rousing her gallant sons 
to the support of that Union which, living and dying, he loved 
so well — left, almost with his parting breath, as his legacy to 
his countrymen, his testimony to the wrong of the system, and 
his scheme for its removal. I know that this Convention will 
justify me when I say that this is a goodly fellowship, and that 
the place for reproach to any American citizen, is not in stead- 
fastly adhering to it, whatever may be said in the case of his 
differing from it. If I have been led into error, these are my 
seducers: nor has any modern light yet dawned upon me which 
lias caused me to distrust or discard such teachers. 

Gentlemen tell us in glowing strains of their deep devotion 
to Virginia, and of their pride in their share of her glory. — But 
the inquiry is a pertinent one: To which Virginia do gentlemen 
refer? for I insist that not merely geographically, but historic- 
ally and intrinsically, there are two. Do they refer to the 
Virginia of the Father of his Country, and his illustrious com- 
patriots, who were at once, and in great part, the founders of 
the Republic, as well as the fathers of the State? Or do they 
refer to the Virginia of Wise, and Floyd, and Letcher, and 
Pryor, and the rest? Shades of the mighty dead! forgive me 
the sacrilegious juxtaposition of your names! But to which 
Virginia do gentlemen refer? Is it the Virginia of Washington, 
or the Virginia of the infamous Ex-Governor, who, far surpass- 
ing any professions here made of his devotion to Virginia, gave 
as his latest proof o\. the intensity of his love, his raid into one 
of her fairest and most fruitful vallies, barbarously laying it 
waste with fire and sword? Surely it must be — it cannot be 
otherwise — that it is Virginia as she was, and not as she is, 
that gentlemen love so well; and in this all good men everywhere 
will join them. And for me also to love there is still another, 
born out of tempests and storms, and to which this body has 
given a name. To the people of West Virginia, who, faithful 



448 THE KENDING OF VIKGINIA. 

{ 

among the faithless, have clung as with the grasp of death, to 
the old Union, which their fathers loved so wisely and so well, 
my devotion goes forth without measure or stint. In all self- 
respectful truthfulness, I say it: from my inmost soul, I honor 
and reverence them. Every man of them, whether a dweller in 
the mountains or in the city, is my brother and my friend; and 
God being my helper, I am his to the end. But by the same rule, 
and in the same measure, from my soul, and by my very man< 
hood, I loathe, and detest and abhor, so much of that other and 
degenerate Virginia, as attempted, not ten months ago, through 
a portion of its representatives, to transfer me and mine, and 
my neighbor and his — at night and in secret — with our all of 
honor and liberty and life, to the rule of the most infamous 
and diabolical usurpation and despotism, that the annals of 
time record. 

I propose in the next place, to consider this proposition in 
the light of expediency. It is always expedient to do right, and 
if what has already been advanced, be admitted as true, the 
present inquiry is already answered. But let us proceed to the 
practical question. What do the best interests of the people of 
West Virginia demand at our hands to-day? I take it for granted 
that we all desire, in behalf of the new State which we are 
seeking to inaugurate, that it shall at once, and with no tardy 
pace, enter upon that high and honorable career of prosperity 
that has been so long and so iniquitously denied us as a people; 
that our virgin lands shall be tilled; that our immense mineral 
wealth shall be disembowelled, that school houses and churches 
shall crown our hill tops, and that the whole land shall smile 
with fruitful fields and happy homes. To the attainment of 
ends so desirable, we will all agree that it is indispensable that 
population, capital and enterprise, shall flow into our borders, 
and through our valleys: and above all that we must have as 
that which lies at the base of all material prosperity, labor; and 
that labor must be free. It is the truth to say, and it is enough 
to say that we have tried enforced labor and it has failed. Nor 
is our experience singular in this regard. It is the world's ex- 
perience everywhere. I shall not trouble the Convention with 
hackneyed statistics. Let any man lift up his own eyes and see. 
At no time and in no place has slave labor sufficed save for the 
coarsest employments, and for the least measure of real and 



battelle'o plea for a free state. 449 

general prosperity. The thing to be done then seems so plain 
a duty as scarcely to admit a moment's hesitancy or doubt. — It 
is to make labor, white labor free. It is to fling its fetters for- 
ever to the winds; and bid it everywhere among our health in- 
spiring mountains and streams, stand proudly up in the strength 
of its own God-given manhood. You may propound in a thou- 
sand seductive forms the old problem, how the two conflicting 
systems may be made to blend and harmonize and prosper; you 
will meet for all your pains with but the old answer of failure. 
You may wooingly invite, as others have done before you, popu- 
lation within your borders; its mighty current will still roar 
around your very barriers, but it will not enter, and dashing 
far beyond you, as of old, it will seek, and successfully seek 
other homes in other lands. Nor is this all or the worst. Let 
us not deceive ourselves; as it has been under the old State 
with the old system, so will it be under the new State with the 
old system. This current of population will not only not replenish 
you, but as it has been for years past, it will itself be replen- 
ished by thousands upon thousands whom you can ill afford to 
spare making their exode from you. The choice is a simple one 
and easily made. Let us for the sake of a prejudice, a caprice, 
a passion it may be, keep our old system, broken, decayed, 
worthless though we know it to be; and with it we must be 
content to take as its unfailing appendage, our untamed forests, 
our untaught youths and bur enfeebled and sluggish growth. 
But could it on the other hand be authoritatively announced 
that at any reasonable fixed though future time, this incubus 
was to be shaken off, in the very hour of that announcement, 
you might safely, multiply the value of your lands by two, and 
before the winter snows shall have melted from your mountain 
tops, the feet of the coming multitude would be heard in your 
streets, and be seen thronging on your highways; and this 
young giant here in the West, delivered at last from the toils 
that have bound him would feel a new energy in every limb, and 
a fresh thrill of life in every vein. 

But we are told that from causes now at work, the old sys- 
tem is destined to soon pass away from the new State in any 
event, and that, therefore, we need take no action concerning 
it here. If this be the fact why not have it "so nominated in 
the bond?" That it should be so written down, if true, is but 

Va-29 



450 THE BENDING OF VIBGINIA. 

simple justice to all parties; it is but justice to our own people — 
both to those who do not desire, and to those who do desire the 
extinction of our present system, that they each in their respec- 
tive relations to it, may know how to adjust themselves to the 
new order of things; it is but justice to those whose coming 
among us, I think we all agree, is well nigh indispensible to the 
attainment of that prosperity we all desire. That these people 
have ample opportunity for choice in the matter of their location, 
whether here or elsewhere, does not admit of a doubt. That 
they will require a certain condition in coming here all past 
experience proves. Is it reasonable then to expect them to accept 
as conclusive, the mere verbal declarations of gentlemen touch- 
ing a future and contingent event, deemed by them so vital? 
Will they not be apt to press upon you the very pertinent in- 
quiry, if the fact be as stated why not, when you may do so 
without harm to the just rights of any one, put it in the "bond?" 
But is it so certain that the expectations of gentlemen will be 
realized without a provision to that end? It is a well known 
fact, that a majority at least of the delegates framing the 
Federal Constitution, believed that after the cessation of the 
African slave trade, slavery itself would soon become extinct in 
this country. As indicative of this, it is remarkable that the 
word slave does not once occur in that instrument; and in the 
passages where obvious reference is had to persons in such a 
condition, other and more general terms are employed^a fact, 
as Mr. Madison tells us, that was not without design. But has 
it passed away? Sir, look around you for the answer. Our 
history in this respect shows, as does the world's history, that 
this system is exceedingly tenacious of life. It dies hard. While 
it has disappeared from a great many of the States, in others 
at the beginning of this war it was stronger than ever, and in 
no State has it, I think, become extinct otherwise than by speci- 
fic enactment. In the States of Pennsylvania, New York, New 
Jersey, and others, it is certain that it was thus terminated. I 
should be most happy to believe, as gentlemen flatter them- 
selves, that this system among us, would gradually and grace- 
fully give way without any action here. But such is not its 
history elsewhere. A lust of power is its peculiar besetment. 
It has virtually controlled the councils of this nation almost 
from the beginning. For forty years with a population, a part 



battelle's plea for a free state. 451 

at least of the time, two to one against it, it has made no de- 
mand, and claimed no exemption that it did not obtain. In 
our own State the like order of things has prevailed. It de- 
manded in the matter of representation that one man in the 
East should be equal to two in the free West. It was done. 
The West bowed its head and received the yoke, and has worn 
it even to this day. It demanded your money to build its high- 
ways; it prohibited you from building j^ours with your own. 
It demanded enormous expenditures for its defence against im- 
aginary dangers. Votes from the free West were all too willing 
to accord them. And now gentlemen tell us that there will be 
but eight per cent, of this element in the new State. Sir, the 
whole past proves that it will rule you, if it were but the half 
Of it. 

And what after all has prompted the almost unanimous and 
life long wish of our people for a new State in West Virginia. 
It cannot be the debt of the State, for this feeling began before 
the debt had acquired any great magnitude; and much as it had 
grown before this war, you propose to pay an equitable share of 
it. It cannot be the intervening of a mere mountain range, for 
precisely the same range divides but does not alienate the east 
and west portions of our neighboring State of Pennsylvania. — 
The true answer is to be found in the wish of the people, not 
always expressed perhaps, but none the less real to escape from 
the utterly selfish domination of this system. What will you 
have gained in the new State if you have but effected an ex- 
change of masters? And let it be borne in mind that this system 
is firmly rooted in many portions of our proposed territory, and 
should you wipe out every syllable on the subject from the new 
Constitution when adopted by the people, even in that form this 
system will still be as thoroughly protected here by law as it 
is in Louisiana. Another point should not be overlooked. When 
this rebellion is crushed out cotton will hardly remain the king 
that he has heretofore so proudly boasted himself to be. — Our 
new State will contain large tracts of unoccupied land with light 
taxes thereon. Is it at all improbable that a certain species of 
property in the region east of us, that has hitherto migrated 
mostly southward, will after the lapse of a short time come this 
way; thus continuing and strengthening its power among us, 
indefinitely. But however this may be, the question still recurs 



452 THE RENDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

as that which will be pressed by thousands of practically inter- 
ested inquirers, what is to be the status of labor in the new 
State? I insist sir, that the question is fundamental and vital. 
Without labor it matters but little what kind of a Constitution 
you make here; or indeed whether you make any at all or not. 
Will you not speak the word that shall ennoble it? Will you not, 
now that you may. forever wipe from the brow of your own 
toiling white fellow citizens, the brand this system has placed 
there? Will you while you enact a clearly defined principle 
touching every other interest, pronounce no policy in regard to 
that which lies at the bottom of them all? Will you under the 
influence of some fatal repulsion on the one hand, or attraction 
on the other, fix your attention chiefly on some remote, and 
minute and immaterial appendage to the building, quite indiffer- 
ent as to how secure or how false the foundation may be! 

But it is said that even if the new Constitution is silent 
upon this question, the Legislature will have full control over 
it. They certainly will have such control if the Constitution, 
in terms, gives it to them. But waiving the inquiry whether a 
question of doubt as to this power might hereafter arise, should 
it not be formally inserted in the Constitution, why should the 
Legislature — wise and patriotic though that body is and will be 
— be expected to act in the direction in which we decline to 
move? There is not the shadow of a doubt touching the entire 
competency of this body in reference to this question; Why de- 
volve upon others responsibilities which we decline to meet? 

But granting that our system of labor may at some time in 
the distant future be changed, by whatever agency, why post- 
pone to an indefinite future, that which we may secure for our 
own times? I have a very great regard for those imaginary, 
and I hope highly respectable personages, my great grand- 
children, and a very high respect for distant generations; with 
the liveliest interest in their welfare, I wish them, with all my 
heart, a good time generally. But I must be excused in say- 
ing that I have a still warmer feeling for my own children, and 
for the people of the present times. But why not do for the 
present that which will so surely enhance the happiness of both 
the present and the future? Why require our young State, just 
entering upon the race for prosperity, to bear one moment 
longer than is necessary, a burden that has enfeebled older and 
otherwise powerful communities? 



BATTELLE^S PLEA FOR A FREE STATE. 453 

But it is said that the present is a very inauspicious time 
to move in this matter. By the way, there has seldom been a 
right time for doing anything on one side of this labor question, 
in this State; there was always an abundance of time for doing 
more than was asked for on the other. In so far as this sugges- 
tion of delay is prompted by deference to the supposed wishes 
of the rebel States, it will excite, I judge, in the people of West 
Virginia, any other feeling rather than that of acquiescence. 
The doings of those States have forced us to assume our present 
attitude for our self-preservation. Is it not asking a good deal 
too much, that that very interest as it elsewhere exists, having 
plunged us and our people into this sea of troubles, we shall 
not now be permitted to save ourselves in our own way, with- 
out still consulting it? Do the people of West Virginia really 
belong to the State of South Carolina, or do they belong only to 
God, their country and themselves? 

But objection is made to any action here on another, and I 
frankly say, much more plausible ground. If I understand it, 
it is this: that our Union brethren of the border States will be 
embarrassed and hindered in their heroic struggles with re- 
bellion, by any such action by this body as is now proposed. 
The coincidence is not a little curious, that precisely the same 
objection, and almost in the very words in which we now hear 
it, was urged in the Legislature of Pennsylvania, more than 
eighty years ago, during the passage of her famous act of 
emancipation, drawn up, I believe, by Dr. Franklin; but the 
objection was urged then, as I hope it will be now, without effect. 
Let it be observed that this occurrence took place in 1780, right 
in the midst of our revolutionary struggle. This is the historian's 
statement of the matter: — "Moderate as it was," — let me say 
in passing that what is here proposed is much more moderate — 
"this act did not pass without a good deal of opposition. Several 
members of Assembly entered a protest against it, acknowledg- 
ing indeed the humanity and justice of manumitting slaves in 
time of peace, but denouncing the present act as 'imprudent' 
and 'premature' and likely to have, by way of example, a most 
dangerous effect on the Southern States, whither the seat of war 
seemed about to be transferred." But as already stated, the ob- 
jection was overruled; and while we all know something of the 
beneficial results of that act, I have yet to hear that it worked 
any injury to the Southern States or any body else. 



454 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

Sir, from my soul I honor the Union men of Kentucky, 
Tennessee, and of any other section similarly circumstanced; 
and living or dying I am one with them in this great struggle. 
But how can the proposed action here hinder them? Other 
States have gone through this very process. Is it an event so 
very alarming or unlocked for that West Virgnia, should it be- 
come a State at all, should become a Free State? Has not 
everybody that was not wilfully blind, anticipated it for years? 
The mere occurrence of the event then by itself, can work no 
such injury. But we will be told that this measure will be 
justly looked upon elsewhere as a General Government policy, 
as its armies advance Southward; and the Union men on the 
border will be hindered thereby in their efforts to sustain that 
Government. I think I state the point fairly. There would be 
some force in this conclusion, were it not for a fatal defect in 
the premise; it is not true. The General Government did recog- 
nize, as in duty bound, the reorganized and restored Govern- 
ment of the State of Virginia. It has to this day done nothing 
beyond that. This Convention is in no sense a General Govern- 
ment organ — it is in no sense a war measure; much less is any 
one act of this body either the one or the other. The General 
Government has wisely abstained, so far as I know, from any 
suggestions to or interference with the deliberations of this 
body; and speaking only from what is in the reach of every 
member here, I state only the plain truth when I say that so far 
from our being convened here under the especial patronage of 
the Federal authorities, it remains to be seen whether we are 
here even with their approval. — But we are here at the instance 
and in the behalf of the people of the proposed new State of 
West Virginia, and of them alone; to form and prepare a State 
Constitution for them and for nobody else. And this brings me 
back to the inquiry which I insist is the only legitimate one in 
this discussion. What do the interests of the people of West 
Virginia require at our hands? We are not here to frame a 
Constitution for either the people of Kentucky or Ohio. — If they 
prefer their present ones they will keep them, if they want new 
ones they are abundantly able to make them. And while they 
attend to their own affairs in their own way, I have yet to learn 
that they have any thought or desire of offensively interfering 
with ours. We need not hope to escape the criticisms of our 



battelle's pee a for a free state. 455 

neighbors upon our work here — friendly or unfriendly as the 
case may be. — It is a privilege we take with all the world; and 
it were unreasonable to expect that it will not be returned. — But 
be assured, sir, that the only effectual way to disarm it of in- 
jury should it come, is by the infusion of a manly self-reliance 
into our labors. — And I beseech gentlemen, to put away from 
them at once and forever the delusion, for it is nothing else, 
that they can successfully ignore this question of the status of 
labor in the new State. — It will not down at your bidding. — You 
may postpone it now; but in doing so you only leave it to come 
up again and again under new and more aggravated forms; the 
one ever present and ever restless element of irritation and dis- 
turbance among us. 

I ask, in conclusion, to be indulged in a personal remark. 
Having been chosen a member of this body, by the generous suf- 
frages of the people of Ohio County, not only without my con- 
sent, but entirely without my knowledge, in my absence from 
home, in entering upon the discharge of duties here which I 
saw not well how to decline, I have not reached the conclusion 
to which I have come, without much anxious thought. Almost 
my only participation hitherto in the discussions of this slavery 
question, has been by way of protesting to the extent of my 
humble ability, not only against the interference by strangers 
with any legal rights of the institution here, but the utter in- 
expediency of some of those far distant discussions of it, in 
which some communities have been too prone to indulge. [ 
should, under like circumstances, pursue the same course again. 
At the same time, I have never concealed my steadfast convic- 
tion, either as to the character of the system, or as to the duty 
of those who have legally and properly to do with it as a civil 
and domestic institution. It is here that for the first time in 
my life, I am charged, along with others, with any such direct 
concern. The direction in which my duty points me, seems 
plainly indicated. 

Another remark. The people of West Virginia have never 
yet demanded of me by way of apology, on which bank of the 
river that washes their shore it pleased God that I should for 
the first time open my eyes on the light. I shall not to-day 
either bemean them or debase myself, by tendering such apology. 
They invited me into their service in the days of my early man- 
hood; and the very labors of the long years since that time, as 



456 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

well as the memory of a thousand kindnesses received at their 
hands, have consecrated in my own regard, the citizenship 
among them which the Constitution of our common country so 
amply secures. My past and my present are here; and if 
Heaven please, my future will be here, to enjoy or suffer with 
this people whatever in His providence may yet be in store for 
us. It has been as a fellow observer, and I will add, as a fel- 
low sufferer with them, that my judgment of the system of 
slavery among us has been formed. We have seen it seeking 
to inaugurate, and in many instances, all too successfully, a 
reign of terror in times of profound peace, of which Austria 
might be ashamed. We have seen it year by year driving out 
from our genial climate, and fruitful soil, and exhaustless na- 
tural resources, some of the men of the very best energy, talent, 
and skill among our population. We have seen also in times of 
peace, the liberty of speech taken away — the freedom of the 
press abolished — and the willing minions of this system in 
hunting down their victims, spare from degradation and insult, 
neither the young nor the gray haired veteran of seventy 
winters, whose every thought was as free from offence against 
society, as is that of the infant of days. And last but not least, 
we have seen its own chosen and favored interpreters, standing 
in the very sanctuaries of our political zion, throughout the 
land, blaspheming the holy principles of popular liberty to 
which the very places where they stood had been consecrated, 
by dooming my child and every man's child that must live by 
labor to a virtual and helpless slavery. And as the natui'al out- 
growth of all this, we have seen this huge barbaric raid against 
popular rights, and against the world's last hope. It has been 
the merit of other attempted revolutions that their motive at 
least was a reaching upward and forward after liberty; it is 
the infamy of this that it is a reaching backward and down- 
ward after despotism. It would put back the hand on the 
world's dial a thousand years. It would put out the world's 
light in the darkness of utter and dreary desl)air. Surely, to 
the extent that we have suffered from these ills, our very man- 
hood calls upon us to guard by all reasonable preventives, 
against their return. 



CHAPTER XVII. 

WEST VIBGINIA AT THE BAR OF THE SENATE. 

SENATOR WILLEY PEESENTS ITS CASE. 

May 29, 1862, in the United States Senate, Mr. Wil- 
ley presented the memorial of the Virginia legislature, 
with accompanying papers, praying that West Virginia 
might be admitted as a State into the Union. Mr. Willey 
proceeded to address the Senate in recital of the events 
which had led up to this application, and of the grounds 
in law and equity on which it was founded. Following 
due reference to the Richmond Convention and its law- 
less acts, he went over the movements in ISTorthwestern 
Virginia, from the Convention in May, 1861, to that 
which had framed this constitution, reading official docu- 
ments from time, to time to show completely the regularity 
and legality of every step which had led u]) to this appli- 
cation. He also addressed himself to the causes which 
had impelled the Northwest to seek this separation. They 
were not temporary in their nature; had not sprung up 
as the result of the secession movement, but were dee])- 
seated and of long standing. They had grown out of 
natural differences, physical and geographical between the 

457 



458 THE RENDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

sections, and of social and political differences due to dif- 
ferent institutions, policies and ideas operating through 
more than half a century. 

When the Senator had concluded his presentation of 
the case of West Virginia, he expressed a preference that 
the papers be referred to a special committee. Mr. Sum- 
ner thought they should take the usual direction given to 
applications of this kind and go to the Committee on Ter- 
ritories. Mr. Willey repeated his preference, but as Mr. 
Sumner was persistent, did not press it. 

SENATOR CARLILE PREPARES A SURPRISE. 

June 23d, the Committee on Territories, of which Mr. 
Carlile was a member and Mr. Wade of Ohio chairman, 
reported a bill for the admission of West Virginia. It 
would Be an astonishing measure if it could be supposed 
the purpose of him who drew it was to promote the ad- 
mission of the State. The fact was afterwards developed 
that the bill had been drawn by Mr. Carlile, who had put 
himself forward in the committee, as he had in Western 
Virginia, as the special champion of the Xew State ; and 
the amazing thing was that Mr. Carlile should have drawn 
such a bill. The committee having no reason to doubt his 
i good faith and recognizing his familiarity with and author- 
itative relation to the subject, allowed him to shape the 
measure in his own way. But the people of West Vir- 
ginia, knowing nothing of the change that had come oVer 
their Senator, chosen with such special honors and in un- 
bounded confidence, were amazed when ihej learned the 
character of the measure which had emanated from the 
committee. 



"WEST VIEGIXIA BEFORE THE SENATE. 459 

It provided, in brief, that before the State should be 
admitted it should include the following counties in addi- 
tion to those embraced in the constitution submitted : 
Clark, Frederick, Warren, Page, Shenandoah, Rocking- 
ham, Augusta, Highland, Bath, Rockbridge, Botetourt, 
Craig and Allegheny. The bill required that another con- 
vention should be assembled when the Governor of Vir- 
ginia might direct "and as soon as may be after the people 
in the several counties may be relieved from the presence 
of armed insurgents ;" and that when a convention of dele- 
gates from all these counties — at that time alternately 
swept by contending armies — should have framed another 
constitution, it should be submitted and all the formalities 
gone over again. Incorporated in the bill was this provi- 
sion for emancipation : "From and after the 4th day of 
July, 1863, the children of all slaves born within the 
limits of the proposed State shall be free." As if a con- 
vention embracing all these Valley counties, with their 
large slave population and strong pro-slavery feeling, 
would ever put such a provision into a constitution ! Mr. 
Carlile himself was strongly pro-slavery in feeling; but 
evidently this provision was demanded by other members 
of the committee, and Mr. Carlile knew it made no differ- 
ence what went into the bill, designed as it was only to 
block admission. 

CARLILE vs. CAKLILE. 

The passage of such a measure by Congress, friends 
and enemies alike, recognized as the defeat of a new State. 
Mr. Carlile himself had declared in the August Conven- 
tion, when the opponents of division were pushing this 



460 TKE BENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

same scheme for taking in the counties of the far South- 
west and of the Valley — which Brown of Kanawha 
pressed again in the Constitutional Convention — that it 
would be fatal to their hopes for separation. "You never 
can and never will," he said, "get with you into a sepa- 
rate State the Valley and the Southwest unless you con- 
quer the people there and force them into your State 
against their consent and interests." Again, in a letter 
to Thomas Elder, of Fairview, Hancock County, Va., 
written August 27, 1861, and published in the newspapers, 
Mr. Carlile said : "We could no more connect with us the 
Southwest and Valley than we can the Piedmont and Tide- 
water districts. Why ? Because our interests are dis- 
similar and our markets lie in different directions ; and 
by connecting them with us we would defeat the very ob- 
ject of a separation." Mr. Carlile, in drawing the bill he 
did, to send back the application and force the inclusion 
of the Valley and Southern counties, was convicted by his 
own unanswerable words of a purpose to defeat entirely 
the proposed division of the State. 

SENATOK WILLEY SEEENE. 

While Carlile was preparing this deadly potion, what 
was Senator Willey about ( His silence and apparent in- 
difference to what was going forward has never been satis- 
factorily explained. It is true the matter had not been put 
into his hands. He may have felt he had been treated 
with scant courtesy when the memorial presented by him 
was sent to a committee of which he was not a member, 
and it would be pardonable if his pride had been some- 



"WEST VIRGINIA BEP^ORE THE SENATE. 461 

what piqued. But if there was offence, it was not the 
people of West Virginia who had given cause for it ; and 
his first duty was to them. It is not to be assumed he did 
not knoAv what his colleague was doing. As a friend of 
the applicant, would he not be on the lookout ; have ascer- 
tained from other members of the committee, if not from 
Mr. Carlile, what was going forward 'i Mr. Willey could 
not have been ignorant of what was being done ; yet both 
the Senate committee and the West Virginia public were 
wholly ignorant of the mischief Mr. Carlile was w^orking 
until the bill was brought into the Senate. 

Then committees and delegations hurried to Washing- 
ton in alarm to ask Chairman Wade what he meant by cut- 
ting the throat of the I^ew State in this ruthh ss way ? 
They proceeded to enlighten Mr. Wade as to the true state 
of the case and to wake up the Western Virginia members 
of the House. Mr. Wade advised them to see their other 
Senator — evidently himself surprised at Mr. Willey's at- 
titude of indifference. Granville Parker, in his "Forma- 
tion," goes into the history of the struggle at Washington, 
with the treachery of one senator and the cold indiffer- 
ence, at least, of the other, to get the new State into a 
proper attitude before Congress, and he is severe upon 
Mr. Willey. Mr. Parker complains first that Mr. Willey 
in his address presenting the memorial to the Senate ig- 
nored the question of emancipation and made no allusion 
to the informal vote on it which had so plainly indicated 
the anti-slavery attitude of the j^eople in the I*^orthwest. 
Mr. Parker with others called on Senator Wade, who ad- 
vised them to see Mr. Willey. They did so. Mr. Parker 
says : 



462 THE EENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

His manner was grave and reticent, but he said, I think, 
he had prepared an amendment he intended to offer when the 
bill came up again. Mr. Parker adds that they called on the 
Virginia representatives, Blair, Brown and Whaley who "were 
more communicative but had faint hopes of success, Whaley 
having said, as we afterwards learned, that the measure "would 
not get a vote in the lower house." That day came the conven- 
tion commissioners — Caldwell, Paxton and Hall. Van Winkle 
had come with tnem as far as Washington but went on to New 
York. Hall left after a day or two. "The rest being in dead 
earnest for a new Sta,te aroused Mr. Willey and the other Vir- 
ginia representatives to a comprehension of the situation and 
what our people were expecting of them. * * * The friends 
had resuscitated and energized the measure, secured the atten- 
tion of Congress and imparted to the measure something of the 
importance it merited. Heroic Ben Wade had become thor- 
oughly aroused. Senator Willey had partially emerged from his 
shell and began to realize that the measure had friends as well 
as enemies — who it would seem had hitherto monopolized his 
attention as well as sympathy. At the head of the latter was 
Mr. Carlile, in disguise but only slightly suspected by his fel- 
lows on the territorial committee." 

When it came to the debate on Trumbull's motion to 
postpone the bill, after it had been amended with Brown's 
substitute, Parker says: 

Mr. Willey in his reply (to Carlile) seemed to have at last 
caught up with the ideas and sentiments the loyal people enter- 
tained on the subject of gradual emancipation — ideas and senti- 
ments they had been for nearly a year expressing in all forms 
and sought to have the convention of which he was a member 
express in the constitution, but were debarred by himself and 
confederates. 

NO SLAVERY FOR SUMNER. 

To go back to the proceedings in the Senate, Mr. Wade, 
after enlightenment, called up the West Virginia bill June 
26th. Mr. Sumner said the provision making free only 



WEST VIRGINIA BEFORE THE SENATE. 463 

children born after July 4, 1863, proposed to recognize 
slavery during the present generation. "Short as life 
may be," he said, "it is too long for slavery. If this con- 
dition is to be adopted and the bill becomes a law a new 
slave. State will take its place in the Union. It may be 
but a few slaves only ; but nevertheless a new slave State. 
That is enough. We all know that it takes very little 
slavery to make a slave State with all the virus of slavery. 
]^ow, by my vote no new State shall ever come into this 
Union and send senators into this body with this virus." 
He moved to strike out the provision and substitute the 
Jeffersonian ordinance : "Within the limits of said State 
there shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude 
otherwise than in punishment of crime, whereof the party 
shall have been duly convicted." The bill going over, Mr. 
Sumner's motion was afterwards voted down. 

ANXIETY IN WEST VIRGINIA. 

July 12th, when the Senate was discussing the ques- 
tion of adjournment, Mr. Wade pressed the need of action 
on the West Virginia bill. He said : 

I never saw any question that excited a wliole community 
with the intensity that this question does that people. Their 
principal men have been here — and are here now — beseeching us 
to act on this subject. The Governor and all the principal men 
of the State whom I have seen — and I have seen many of them 
— say it is the universal opinion that if left in the hands of their 
inveterate enemies they will have to abandon their property and 
homes and seek residence somewhere else. 



464: THE KENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

Mr. Willej, following Mr. Wade, said: 

I am in receipt of letters daily from every section of the 
State which, in addition to the information given by the gentle- 
men now in this city at their own expense for many days, assure 
me of the fact that unless relief is extended by giving them a 
separate State organization they will be compelled to leave all 
they have of property in the world except what they can take 
with them and find asylum somewhere else. 

Mr. Sumner in the course of some remarks said of this 
West \' irginia question : 

T erhaps no question of greater importance has ever been 
presented to the Senate. It concerns the whole question of 
slavery; it concerns also the question of States rights; it con- 
cerns also the results of this war. Look at it, therefore, in any 
aspect you please, and it is a great question. 

WILLEY OFFERS EMANCIPATION. 

July 14th, the bill was called up by Senator Wade, 
who had meanwhile become well informed as to the pre- 
cise effect and intent of Mr. Carlile's scheme for send- 
ing the constitution back, to be made over by a new con- 
vention, to include new territory east of the mountains 
having a large slave population and at that time ground 
under the hoof of contending armies. 

Mr. Willey offered a substitute conforming to the 
boundaries defined in, the constitution, with this provision 
in regard to emancipation : 

That after the 4th day of July, 1863, the children born of 
slave mothers within the limits of said State shall be free, and 
that no law shall be passed by said State by which any citizen 
of either of the States of this Union shall be excluded from the 
enjoyment of the privileges and immunities to which such citizen 



WEST VIKGINIA BEFORE THE SENATE. 465 

is entitled under the Constitution of the United States; provided 
that the convention that ordained the constitution aforesaid, 
to be reconvened in the manner presci'ibed in the schedule 
thereto annexed, shall by a solemn public ordinance declare the 
assent of the said State to the said fundamental conditions, and 
shall transmit to the President of the United States on or before 
the 15th of November, 1862, an authentic copy of said ordinance; 
upon receipt whereof the President by proclamation shall an- 
nounce the fact; whereupon, and without any further proceed- 
ing on the part of Congi^ess, the admission of said State into the 
Union shall be considered as complete. 

Mr. Wade moved to amend this by inserting in the 
proper connection: ''That all slaves under twenty-one 
years of age shall be free when they arrive at the age of 
twenty-one." 

THOUGH NOT '"PERSONALLY AGREEABLE." 

Mr. Willey's reply to this showed how half-hearted he 
"was in proposing this provision for emancipation. He 
would have "greatly preferred" that the State be admitted 
with the constitution exactly as presented, without con- 
dition or amendment ; but he felt some deference was due 
to the views of other senators and he had made an advance 
beyond "what was personally agreeable" to himself in the 
proposition he had already offered. He hoped Mr. Wade 
would allow the vote to be taken on it. He suggested the 
effect of the provision offered by Mr. Wade would be that 
as most of the slave population was in the counties along 
the borders of Kentucky and Virginia, these young ne- 
groes, as they neared the period of their emancipation, 
would be "silently transferred across the lines and sold 

Va.-30 



466 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

and shipped off South, thus exchanging the mild form of 
slavery in West Virginia for the more rigorous form in 
other slave States." 

Mr. Carlile moved to amend Mr. Willey's substitute 
by the insertion of a provision that ratification by the Con- 
vention should not be sufficient, but that the conditions 
imposed by Congress should be ratified by a vote of the 
people. On this he made an ingenious demagogic argu- 
ment which had no weight with those familiar with the 
situation in West Virginia but which so evidently told on 
the Senate that, on suggestion from friends in the lobby, 
Mr, Willey accepted the amendment, declaring at the same 
time that the Convention was thoroughly representative of 
the sentiment throughout the State. He added that there 
was not a loyal miin in Northwestern Virginia who was 
•not that day "life and soul" for division. The discussion 
was continued and so prolonged by Mr. Carlile that Mr. 
Pomeroy said to him sharply that if he was not in favor of 
the admission of the State he could not expect others to 
be; and that if the people of Western Virginia "did not 
send senators here who are in favor of this measure, they 
certainly cannot expect to get it through." 

WITHDRAWS AND OFFERS THE BROWN BILL. 

Mr. Willey withdrew the substitute he had presented 
and offered in lieu of it a bill which had been prepared by 
Hon. William G. Brown of the House of Representatives. 
Mr. Brown's bill provided that "the children of slaves 
born within the limits of the State after the 4th day of 
July, 1863, shall be free, and no slave shall be permitted 
to come into the State for permanent residence." 



WEST VIKGIXIA BEFOEE THE SE^'ATE. 467 

Mr. Lane of Kansas moved to amend tins emancipation 
provision bj adding "that children under ten years of age 
shall.be free at twenty-one, and slaves over ten and under 
twenty-one shall be free at twenty-five." This amendment 
was adopted. Mr. Carlile then moved to strike out of the 
substitute the body of the bill — a test motion. The Senate 
refused by a vote of 25 to 11, which showed that the 
friends of admission had won. 

TKUMBULL JOINS CAELILE. 

Mr. Trumbull declared himself opposed to the admis- 
sion of the State. He moved to postpone the further con- 
sideration of the bill till the first Monday in December. 
Mr. Carlile said he would vote for that motion. He would 
never consent to have the organic law of a State framed 
by the Congress of the United States — meaning he would 
not consent that Congress should impose conditions. Yet 
that was just what his own bill j)roposed ; and it went be- 
yond the Brown bill in not only requiring emancipation 
but compelling the inclusion of a large territory so noto- 
riously at variance with that in the original boundary as 
to destroy the homegeneity of the State ; and it even under- 
took to prescribe the number and qualifications of dele- 
gates. 

Carlile's closest friend in the Senate was Senator 
Waldo P. Johnson of Missouri, nephew of Ex-Gov. Jo. 
Johnson, of Virginia, who was closely connected by mar- 
riage with the Clarksburg Goffs. He and Carlile had 
long been intimate personal friends. Johnson was on the 
Southern side of the national issue and left the Senate 



468 THE RENDII^G OF VIRGINIA. 

about 1864 and went South, returning to Missouri at the 
close of the war. I have always believed it was his inHu- 
ence which drew Carlile away from the straight path which 
had led him into the Senate. From this bosom friend 
Mr. Carlile might have learned that Missouri afforded a 
most striking instance of the exercise of "Congressional 
dictation" to a State seeking admission. 

- There was no lack of precedents to justify Congress 
in making conditions, if precedents had been needed. But 
the very discretion vested in Congress by the Constitution 
to consent to the admission of a State or refuse it includes 
the right to make any conditions they may deem necessary 
to make the application acceptable. Perhaps the closest 
parallel to the West Virginia case was Missouri, wdiich 
went up to Congress with a constitution that forbade free 
negroes entering the State — just as West Virginia now 
proposed. Congress refused to admit Missouri until this 
prohibition had been taken out. The Missouri Conven- 
tion took it out, and after a year's delay President Monroe, 
by proclamation, declared the admission complete, pre- 
cisely as President Lincoln did in the case of West Vir- 
ginia. 

WILLEY GROWS EMPHATIC. 

Mr. Willey, following Mr. Carlile, said his colleague 
in the position he had taken misrepresented three-fourths 
of the loyal people of the State, and the objection inter- 
posed by him was both calculated and "designed to thwart" 
the whole movement. 



ADMISSION PASSES THE SENATE. 469 

WADE UNMASKS CARLILE. 

Chairman Wade explained how the committee had been 
imposed upon by Mr. Carlile in his character of pretended 
friend of the liew State, and how zealous he had been in 
the earlier stages in its behalf. Said Senator Wade : 

That there is to be a separation is a foregone conclusion, 
and no man has urged it upon the committee more strongly than 
the Senator who now opposes immediate action. He, of all 
men in the committee, is the man who penned all these bills 
and drew them up. He is the man who has investigated all the 
precedents to see how far you could go in this direction. It 
was to his lucid mind we were indebted for the fact that there 
were no legal or constitutional barriers in the way of this 
proposition. He submitted to the labor; he did it cheerfully; 
he did it backed by the best men of his State and section — and 
what did they say? They said "We cannot live any longer with 
Eastern Virginia. Independent of the great controversy that 
has sprung up in the Nation, we have a controversy of old stand- 
ing that renders our connection with old Virginia absolutely 
impossible." He is the gentleman who impressed their opinions 
upon the committee as strongly as anybody else; and what 
change has come over the spirit of his dream I know not. His 
conversion is greater than that of St. Paul. He has persuaded 
us that the measure is right; he has appeared side by side with 
his able Governor who urged this upon us as a measure vital 
to the interests of the State he represents. All at once, after 
persuading us to bring the question before Congress, and when 
we expected his powerful aid to help push it through, we are 
brought up standing by his powerful opposition. 

PASSED BY THE SENATE. 

The Senate voted down Mr. Trumbull's motion to post- 
pone, and passed the bill by a vote of 23 to 17. 



470 THE REISTDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

POSTPONED IN THE HOUSE. 

In the House of Rejaresentatives two days later the 
Senate bill for the admission of West Virginia came up 
and was read the first and second time, when Mr. Segar, 
a Virginia member from the Fortress Monroe district, ob- 
jected to its third reading. He moved to lay on the table, 
but the House refused by 70 to 42. Roscoe Conkling 
moved the postponement of the bill to the second Tuesday 
in December, and it was agreed to by a vote of 63 to 52. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

THE LEGISLATURE REPUDIATES SENATOR CARLILE. 

December t), 1862, the General Assembly of Virginia, 
at Wheeling, passed a joint resolution reciting "that feel- 
ing the greatest anxiety and interest in the successful is- 
sue of the movement for a new State in Western Virginia, 
we earnestly request the House of Representatives of the 
United States to take up and pass without alteration or 
amendment the bill which passed the Senate of the United 
States on the 14th of July last" for the admission of West 
Virginia as a State into the Union. This resolution was 
telegraphed the same evening. 

Three days later, the Assembly adopted a joint reso- 
lution reciting that they had by resolution at the session 
in July, 1862, "instructed the Senators of this State in 
Congress to sustain the Federal government in its efforts 
to maintain the supremacy of the laws and preserve the 
integrity of the Union, and by a legislative act of the 13th 
of May, 1862, requested them to use their endeavors to 
obtain the consent of Congress to the admission of West 
Virginia into the Union," and Senator Carlile having 
"failed to sustain the legitimate efforts of the Federal 
government to suppress the insurrection and having op- 
posed by his votes in the Senate measures absolutely neces- 
sary to the preservation of the Union and the enforcement 

471 



4Y2 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

of the laws, and having also bv his speeches and votes in 
the Senate opposed the bill for the admission of West Vir- 
ginia into the Union," it was resolved that he be "respect- 
fully requested to resign his seat." These resolutions the 
Governor was requested to forward to the senators and 
representatives in Congress with request to present the 
same in each House. 

BURNS HIS BRIDGES. 

This was the same legislature which had chosen Mr. 
Carlile the year before with complete unanimity. Their 
request for his resignation showed how entirely he had 
abandoned the attitude of loyalist and champion of a new 
State, which had won him the distinction of an unopposed 
election. He did not resign — a fact which showed still 
more plainly that he had burned the bridges between him- 
self and the people of West Virginia. 



CHAPTEK XIX. 

WEST VIRGINIA RUNS THE GAUNTLET OE THE 
HOUSE. 

CONWAY, OF KANSAS, DELIVERS FIEST BLOW. 

December 9th, 1862, the Senate bill for the admission 
of West Virginia was taken up as the order of the day in 
the House of Representatives. Hon. John A. Bingham, of 
Ohio, had charge of the bill and allotted the time for de- 
bate. The discussion ran through part of two days, but 
we will deal with it as if continuous. 

''a spontaneous pkoduction." 

Mr. Conway, of Kansas, was first to take the floor. 
He did not recognize the proposed division of Virginia as 
having received the assent of the Legislature which the 
Constitution requires. He referred to the reorganized 
State government as "a spontaneous production of the soil. 
A number of individuals met at Wheeling and, without 
any legal authority whatever, arranged a plan for a gov- 
ernment." True, the President and the Senate had recog- 
nized this as the actual State of Virginia, but this was "of 
no binding force" on the House. He stated the argument 
in favor of the validity of this government as being : "that 
the original State of Virginia fell into treason and be- 
came only a void and caused a vacuum which could only 

473 



474 THE KENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

be filled in this way ;" and then proceeded to argue against 
that proposition. He held that if the whole personnel 
abandoned its functions, the State organization falls and 
the sovereignty necessarily accrues to the United States. 

VIRGINIA REVERTS TO TERRITORY. 

The country assumes the condition of ordinary govern- 
ment territory. A State without a government is an im- 
possibility. A State is that political organization of a 
community which invests it with a public faculty. "Where 
there is no government there is no State, but an incoherent 
mass." * * * "The vacation of all the offices of a 
State * * * by any event not provided for in the Con- 
stitution, by which it would be left without agents to carry 
it on, would of course necessitate a failure. But this 
would be the end of the State. No man or set of men of 
their own will would be authorized to assume its functions. 
The territory would belong to the United States, as would 
any other territoiy which might fall into its possession 
through conquest, discovery or other cause." In the case 
of the Dorr rebellion in Rhode Island, in 1842, the con- 
stitution of the State was obnoxious to the people and they 
adopted another and tried to set up another government. 
The President sent the military into Rhode Island and 
put down the revolt, and Dorr was sent to the penitentiary. 

BROWN CLAIMS CONSTITUTIONAL REGULARITY. 

Mr. Brown, of (West) Virginia, replied to Mr. Con- 
way. He first quoted Section 3 of Article IV of the Con- 
stitution of the United States providing how new States 



THE DEBATE IN THE HOUSE. 47 5 

may be admitted. He referred to the admission of the ter- 
ritory of Kentucky, framed out of the territory of Vir- 
ginia, as a precedent showing it was competent for Con- 
gress to admit a State formed within the jurisdiction of 
another State. He cited the fact that the Senate by the 
admission of the Senators had recognized the Wheeling 
Legishiture as the Legislature of Virginia, and the House 
had done the same by the admission of members elected 
under writs issued by Governor Peirpoint. The Execu- 
tive department of the United States government had rec- 
ognized the Wheeling government by the payment to it of 
$41,000 held in the treasury as Virginia's share of the 
proceeds of public land sales. A State court in Ohio had 
recently recognized the Wheeling government as the State 
of Virginia, which had applied for a mandamus to compel 
a railroad cdmpany to assign $200,000 of bonds for the 
benefit of the State of Virginia. Mr. Brown then turned 
to the question of the original powers of the people. The 
principle was laid dowai in the Declaration of Indepen- 
dence that the legislative powers of the people cannot be 
annihilated ; "that when the functionaries to whom they 
are entrusted become incapable of exercising them, they 
revert to the people, who have the right to exercise them 
in their primitive and original capacity." Referring to 
the turning over of Virginia to the Southern Confederacy, 
he said the people in the loyal counties of Western Vir- 
ginia thus deprived of government, held county meetings 
and aj)pointed delegates who met in W^heeling and pro- 
vided for elections to fill vacancies in the Legislature 
caused by the withdrawal of disloyal representatives. 
These elections were held throughout Virginia wherever 



476 THE KENDING OP' VIRGINIA. 

the people chose to hold them. He denied the power of a 
State to secede. Although Virginia could not commit 
treason, her functionaries might, and leave the legislative 
and executive power with the i>eople to whom they orig- 
inally and primitively belonged. The revenue in the ter- 
ritory covered by West Virginia, as fixed by the auditor of 
Virginia in 1859, was $620,061. The people of Western 
Virginia, said Mr. Brown, were on the point of revolution 
in 1829-30, when Eastern Virginia yielded a small pit- 
tance of the power to them. "In 1850 we were again upon 
the point of revolution because we were denied our proper 
representation in the Legislature. They yielded to us our 
proper representation in the House but denied it to us in 
the Senate. As an equivalent for this concession, they 
retained the provision that the Legislature should not tax 
negroes under twelve years old. The remaining portion 
of the negro population was only taxed as property at 
$300 while every article of our property was taxed to its 
full value. We protested against it ; but we were power- 
less because they had retained in the Legislature an undue 
proportion of the representative power." 

COLFAX SECONDS HIM. 

Mr. Colfax follow^ing, referred to the several depart- 
ments of the government which had recognized the Re- 
stored State government at Wheeling. The War Depart- 
ment had recognized Governor Peirpoint's commissions 
to the officers of the volunteer regiments of Virginia as 
commissions emanating from rightful and legal authority ; 
the Secretary of the Interior in giving notice of the con- 
gressional apportionment under the census of 1860, had 



THE DEBATE IN THE HOUSE. 



477 



done tlie same. The House of Kepresentatives bj the ad- 
mission of Mr. Blair from the Parkersburg district and 
Mr. Segar from the district around Fortress Monroe, 
elected under writs issued by Governor Peirpoint, had 
done the same. 

Mr. Olin denied the validity of the position taken by 
Mr. Conway, that the area of a seceded State — it being 
denied that secession could take place — could be thro^vn 
into a territory and governed by Congress the same as 
other territories. 

CONWAY CLAIMS BELLIGERENT RIGHTS FOR CONFEDERACY. 

Mr. CouAvay, in subsequent explanation, said that 
while secession was unlawful, a State could be released 
from its obligation to the Federal government by revolu- 
tion. * * * ''These rebellious States have acquired a 
belligerent character which gives them international status, 
which is entirely incompatible with the Federal status. 
They are beyond the Federal system. These States stand 
where they may be regarded by us as a foreign power and 
where we can make war upon them as on a foreign power." 
He maintained, therefore, that Western Virginia had fal- 
len into our possesion by conquest, and it was within our 
power to govern that people as a military dependency. He 
regretted they did not institute a territorial government 
there in the beginning of the war. 

PEOPLE BETTER THAN POLITICIANS IN WEST VIRGINIA. 

Mr. Hutchins, referring to the question of slavery in 
the new State and quoting the gradual emancipation clause 
in the bill, remarked that "the people were better than 



478 THE RENDING OF VIEGINIA. 

the politicians in West Virginia ;" for though the Con- 
vention had failed to submit to the people the question 
whether thev would abolish slavery, the people themselves, 
without being invited to do so and without any form of 
law to that effect, had by a large majority voted against 
slavery. 

Mr. Crittenden argued that the government at Wheel- 
ing was not the State of Virginia. 

Mr. Edwards said there was no legal Legislature or 
government in Virginia after that government put itself 
in the attitude of rebellion against the government of the 
United States. A Convention of the whole people of Vir- 
ginia was called at Wheeling; which Convention framed 
a government for the State; and the legislative branch of 
the government thus established had given its consent to 
the division. 

Horace Maynard spoke at length in favor of admission 
and in defense of the legality of the proceedings that had 
led up to this application. 

THAD. Stevens" unique position. 

• Thaddeus Stevens announced his purpose to vote for 
the bill ; but he was not "deluded," he said, "by the idea 
that we are admitting this State in pursuance of the Con- 
stitution of the United States." It was "a mockery" to 
say that the Legislature of Virginia had consented. He 
regarded the secession of the State as treason on the part 
of individuals ; but so far as the municipality or corpora- 
tion was concerned, it was a valid act and governed the 
State. "The majority of the people of Virginia was the 



THE DEBATE IIS" THE HOUSE. 479 

State of Virginia, although, individuals had committed 
treason." He held, therefore, that the State of Virginia 
had never given its consent; but they might admit West 
Virginia "not by virtue of any provision of the Constitu- 
tion of the United States but under our absolute power 
^vhich the laws of war give us in the circumstances in 
which we are placed." He should vote for the bill on that 
theory and that alone. He declared the Union never could 
be restored as it was ; with his consent it never should be 
restored with slavery to be protected by it. He was in 
favor of admitting West Virginia because she came with a 
provision which would make her a free State, and because 
he had confidence in the people of West Virginia and in 
the worth of the men sent here to represent them. 

Bingham's masterly presentation. 

Mr. Bingham closed the debate. He began by saying 
that if the theory of those who, like Conway and Stevens, 
held that Virginia had simply been reduced to the condi- 
tion of a territory was good, all constitutional objection to 
the admission of West Virginia was swept away. For 
there were too many precedents to claim that a territory 
which had framed its own constitution could not be ad- 
mitted without an enabling act. He referred particularly 
to Michigan and Tennessee. 

He next noticed the position taken by Segar, of (East) 
Virginia, who had denied that the reorganized government 
at Wheeling was constitutional or legal. Yet Segar had 
been chosen to his seat in this House at an election held 



480 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

under a writ issued by Governor Peirpoint ; and in im- 
peaching Peirpoint's authority, he was simply impeaching 
his own title to a seat in this body. 

On the question of the rightfulness of that reorganized 
government, he said those people in a State who organize 
treason against the United States are not any part of the 
State. The people of a State have a right to local govern- 
ment. It is essential to their existence, and they can have 
it only under State authority. It cannot be afforded them 
b}^ the Federal government. The minority of those people 
could not by the treason of a majority be stripped of their 
right to protection within the State by State laws. If the 
majority in Virginia had turned rebel, the State was in 
the loyal minority ; who have the right to administer the 
laws and maintain the authority of the State government ; 
and to that end to elect a State Legislature and Executive 
by which they may call upOn the Federal government for 
the protection ''against domestic violence" guaranteed by 
the Constitution. In such event, the majority being rebels 
must submit to the law of the minority if enforced by the 
power of the National government. This was no new 
idea. In confirmation, he referred to a letter addressed 
by Mr. Madison to the American people, wherein he dis- 
cussed the fourth section of Article IV of the Constitu- 
tion which provides for that guaranty. Mr. Madison fore- 
told that it might come to pass that the majority of the 
people of a State might conspire together to sweep away 
the rights of the minority as citizens of the United States. 
In that paper Mr. Madison says : 

Why may not illicit combinations for purposes of violence 
be formed as well by a majority of a State as by a majority of a 



THE DEBATE IX THE HOUSE. 481 

county or district of the same State? And if the authority 
of the State ought in the latter case to protect the local magis- 
tracy, ought not the Federal Government in the former to sup- 
port the State authority? 

This was precisely the condition of things in Virginia. 
The majority had become traitors. The rejDresentatives 
whom the people had elected, who were required by the ex- 
isting constitution of Virginia as well as by the Federal 
Constitution to take an oath to support the Constitution of 
the United States, when they foreswore themselves and 
entered into a deliberate bargain and sale with Vice Presi- 
dent Stephens of the Southern Confederacy, surrendered 
all right to represent any part of the people of Virginia. 
In this state of things, according to the logic of some gen- 
tlemen, the people of Virginia coidd have no legislation, 
lie appealed to the principle affirmed in the Declaration 
of Independence that "the legislative powers, incapable of 
annihilation, have returned to the people at large for their 
exercise." Xo matter who turns traitor, the legislative 
powers are incapable of annihilation. The power re- 
mained with the loyal people of Virginia to call a con- 
vention and reinstate their government. The members of 
the Legislature elected on the 23d of May adhering to the 
United States and meeting at Wheeling, were the Legisla- 
ture of Virginia. Those of them who took the road to 
Richmond never became a part of the Legislature of Vir- 
ginia at all. 

The ultimate power, Mr. Binglum said, to decide be- 
tween the two bodies which was the rightful Legislature 
was in the Congress of the United States ; and it was com- 
petent for Congress to say that not a man of those who 

Va-31 



482 THE BENDING OF VIEGINIA. 

refused to take the oath prescribed by the Federal Consti- 
tution and who did take the oath of that treasonable cofl- 
spiracy at Richmond, ever became a member of the Legis- 
lature of the State of Virginia. He referred to the case of 
Luther vs. Borden, the Rhode Island case of 1842. Rhode 
Island had been in revolution. Two opposing governments 
bad been in operation. Who should decide which was the 
lawful government ? The case finally went to the Supreme 
Court of the United States, and Chief Justice Taney in 
delivering the opinion of the court said that it was a polit- 
ical question and that the decision of it by the Federal 
Executive under the authority of Congress was binding 
on the judiciary. Taney also said the power to decide 
which of two governments in a State is the true govern- 
ment is in Congress. If Congress should now decide that 
the people of Western Virginia had no right to maintain 
the government they had established, under which this 
application had been made for the admission of a new 
State, all that remained would be for the Executive to 
follow their example and leave that people to their fate. 
Such a decision by Congress would bind the judiciary to 
hold the legislation of that people for the protection of 
their lives and property void. It would bind the judiciary 
of the State itself and everybody appointed by the Execu- 
tive to execute the laws within that State ; and the effect 
would be to say that inasmuch as the majority have taken 
up arms against the government of the United States and 
of Virginia, the loyal minority are without the protection 
of local State law ; that their representatives duly elected 
and qualified are not and cannot be called the Legislature 
of Virginia. 



THE DEBATE IN THE HOUSE. 483 

Mr. Bingiiani thought he had said enough to show that 
the Legishiture which assembled at Wheeling was the 
Legislature of the State of Virginia ; and that it remained 
with this body alone to determine whether they should be 
recognized as such. "If jou affirm it is/' he said, "there 
is' no appeal from your decision. I am ready to affirm it, 
and upon the distinct ground that I do recognize, in the 
language of Mr. Madison, even the right of a minority in 
a revolted State to be jDrotected under the Federal Consti- 
tution by both Federal and State law." 

Discussing the question of expediency, Mr. Bingham 
said : 

I fear that the chief objection at last to the organization of 
this New State and its admission into the Union, however gentle- 
men may disguise their thoughts and shrink from a manly 
avowal of them, is not that there is any constitutional objec- 
tion to it — that there is anything inexpedient in it when you take 
into consideration the whole interests of the whole people of the 
Republic — but simply that it is an inroad, which will become 
permanent and enduring if you pass this bill, into that ancient 
Bastile of slavery, out of which has come this wild, horrid con- 
flict of arms which stains this distracted land of ours this day 
with the blood of our children. 

He trusted the bill would pass, because he had an abid- 
ing confidence in the people who were asking for this ad- 
mission that they would not only ratify the condition for 
gradual emancipation, but would speedily avail thcmselvef^ 
in their legislation of the opportunity presented to tl'em 
by the President's proclamation to inaugurate immediate 
or ultimate emancipation for everv slave within the State. 



484 THE RENDIJ^G OF VIRGINIA. 

If CongTess refused to pass the bill and Virginia at- 
tempted by their present Legislature to adopt the emanci- 
pation policy of the President, the argument would be 
thrown back into their faces that by the decision of Con- 
gress it was not the Legislature of Virginia and had no 
power to consent to the proclamation of the President. 

The hour for closing debate having arrived, the bill 
was read the third time and passed by a vote of 96 to 55, 



CHAPTER XX. 

IN" THE HANDS OF THE PRESIDENT. 

MK. LINCOLN ADVISES WITH CABINET. 

The bill for the admission of West Virginia went to 
the President. December 23d he asked his Cabinet ad- 
visers for written opinions on two questions regarding the 
act of admission : 

First, Is the act constitutional ? 

Second, Is it expedient ? 

West Virginia had come to this last door, and all that 
had been done up to this point would be fruitless unless 
the President opened it. All the steps required by the 
constitutional prescription had been taken with careful 
conformity ; but all this went for nothing if the President 
should in the end refuse his approval; for it would have 
been hopeless to attempt to carry the measure through the 
two houses again against his judgment. 

PEIRPOINT SENDS A MESSAGE. 

Before we come to the Cabinet opinions and Mr. Lin- 
coln's own opinion, let us note a statement made by Gov- 
ernor Peirpoint touching his part in contributing to the 
reasons which decided the President to approve the act. 

485 



486 THE KENDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

About the last days of December, James W. Paxton, Ed- 
ward M. Xorton and A, W. Campbell went to Governor 
Peirj)oint at his office in the Wheeling Custom House to 
confer with him on the anxious situation. It was agreed 
that the Governor should wire Mr. Lincoln urging him to 
sign the bill. Mr. Campbell sat down at the table and 
wrote the message as agreed on. Governor Peirpoint told 
Mr. Campbell as late as 1897 that Mr. Lincoln had said 
to him that this message had decided him to sign the bill. 
The precise wording of a message having such a result 
w^ould be of unusual interest to West Virginians as a his- 
torical fact. All four of the men who shared in sending 
it are dead, and it seems certain no copy was kept. A let- 
ter to President McKinley's secretary, to ask if it would be 
possible to find the telegram in the files of the Executive 
office, brought courteous reply from Mr. Cortelyou that he 
was informed files of the President's correspondence were 
not at that period kept at the Executive mansion, and that 
after Mr. Lincoln's death all papers remaining there w^ere 
distributed among the departments. Colonel Hay, Secre- 
tary of State, had been one of Mr. Lincoln's secretaries ; 
and thinking it possible he might be able to suggest in 
what department the paper could be found, I addressed an 
inquiry to him. This brought reply from Mr. John G. 
Nicolay (another of Mr. Lincoln's assistants, and col- 
laborator with Colonel Hay on their book "Abraham Lin- 
coln"), who wrote that he had no recollection of such a 
telegram ; that if received "it ought to be among the Lin- 
coln papers; but after examination," he says, "I do not 
find it among such as we have." "I think," Mr. Nicolay 
adds, "that Governor Peirpoint's recollection must be at 



A MESSAGE TO LINCOLlSr. 487 

fault if he stated that Mr. Lincohi had told him he had 
signed the "West Virginia bill merely because of the Gov- 
ernor's request." 

THE GOVERNOR'S DAUGHTER TELLS ABOUT IT. 

Not feeling convinced by Mr. Nicolay's conclusion, I 
made some inquiry of Governor Peirpoint's daughter, Mrs. 
Anna Peirpoint Siviter, of Pittsburgh, who wrote me un- 
der date of February IG, 1001, the following: 

Father's memory was absolutely faultless to the day of his 
death except a few weeks at the beginning of his illness at Fair- 
mont; and I have heard him tell the story many times sub- 
stantially as you tell it and know it v/as true. The only point 
I am not certain of is whether it was a letter or telegram that 
was sent. My brother was in the room at the time the con- 
versation took place between my father and Mr. Campbell in 
1897 concerning the sending of the telegram and Mr. Campbell 
as well as my father remembered the occurrence. This adds 
Mr. Campbell's evidence to my father's that such a message 
was sent. But even if I had not heard either of them make 
this statement, I should know it was true from a conversation 
I had with Senator Willey the day after my father's funeral, 
in March, 1899. He told me the whole history of President 
Lincoln's signing the bill. Mr. Willey was intensely anxious 
to obtain the President's signature at once and visited the White 
House in company with another gentleman. The President 
asked them to see the different members of the Cabinet and 
return to him the following n;orning (possibly a day later), 
when he would make known his decision. They went to see the 
Cabinet, and on the day set went to the White House so early 
that the servants were still cleaning the President's private 
office. They forced their way in, however, and in a few minutes 
the President appeared, and after making some laughing remark 
about their early appearance, he told them he was ready for 
them: and, stooping down, took out a bundle of papers from 
the drawer of his desk, stating that they contained the written 



488 THE REXDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

opinions of the members of the Cabinet. The effect of the Presi- 
dent's comment on these opinions was that they were not so 
unanimous as to lead him to sign the bill; "but," he continued, 
"I have another paper here which has had a great Influence 
upon me and I will read it to you." He then drew out and read 
to them a message which they knew was my father's; "and this, ' 
Mr. Lincoln said, "was the cause of my doing this" (or words to 
that effect). And then he showed his signature to the bill. 

1 s;uppose you know the substance of the dispatch. It was 
that whether the act was constitutional or not, the New State 
must be created. It was a iva'r measure. The Union was en- 
gaged in a life-and-death struggle, and the bill must be signed. 

"archie" CAMPBELL INTERVIEWS MR. LIXCOLN. 

Regarding this message to the President, Mr. Camp- 
bell's daughter, Mrs. Jessie Campbell Nave, of Bethany, 
West Virginia, in answer to my inquiries, wrote me under 
date of August 15, 1901 : 

Father had more to do with this than any one else; and It 
was he who virtually wrote the message, for that I have known 
this many a year. And, furthermore, father went on him- 
self and had a personal interview with Mr. Lincoln, who came 
into father's room in the hotel while he was performing his 
ablutions and took a seat on a chair in the most off-hand way, 
asking father to explain the whole case to him — which you can 
imagine he did thoroughly. 

Corrective of this, Mrs. 'Save wrote me in a letter 
dated December 2, 1901 : 

I forgot to tell you further of father's interview with Lin- 
coln. I had nothing bearing on the subject in my possession, 
only Mr. Nave and I had listened with interest to father's 
account of his trip to Springfield, 111., to see the President and 
enlighten him as to the true state of affairs then existing in the 
western part of Virginia. Mr. Lincoln surprised father at his 
ablutions in his modest apartments in what was doubtless a 



OPINIONS OF CABINET. 489 

very second-rate hostelry, for in those days the United States 
could boast few good hotels. I think I told you when I wrote 
you about the matter before that the meeting took place in 
Washington, but, talking it over with Mr. Nave, I find it was in 
Springfield, 111. 

Mr. Willev's statement, as given by Mrs. Siviter, dif- 
fers in some detail from that printed by Hon. J. B. Blair 
in the Wlieeling Intelligencer in 1876. That statement 
(copied elsewhere), touching the visit to the President 
and the reading of the Cabinet opinions, does not mention 
any other paper. According to Mr. Blair, the bill was 
not exhibited w^ith the President's signature at that visit, 
but later, on Xew Year's morning, when Mr. Blair called 
on the President by himself. On this point, Mr. Blair's 
account is confirmed by Granville Parker's report of what 
Mr. Blair told him at Washington soon after. 

A careful reading of Mr. Lincoln's deciding opinion, 
printed in succeeding pages, shows that the considerations 
suggested in Governor Peirpoint's message coincided 
closely with the drift of his owm conclusions. How much 
the suggestions may have influenced those conclusions, the 
reader w^ill judge with all the available facts before him. 

Mr. Xicolay kindly offered to have full copies of these 
Cabinet opinions made for me, but the limits set for this 
v/ork not permitting to any extent the printing of docu- 
ments in extenso, I have used only the extracts necessary 
to give the substance of them as found in Vol. VI of JSTico- 
lay and Hay's "Abraham Lincoln." Mr. Lincoln's own 
deciding opinion is reproduced in full. To West Virginia 
people this paper is of especial interest. It gives President 
Lincoln one more strong claim to their gratitude, and their 
admiration, for we see how easily his grasp of the question 



490 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

sweeps away the trivialities woven around it by Welles, 
Blair and Bates, and liow he gets right at the heart of the 
controversy in the simple and masterful way peculiar to 
him. 

CABINET EVENLY DIVIDED. 

Mr. Seward: The political body which has given consent 
is incontestably the State of Virginia. So long as the United 
States do not recognize the secession, departure or separation of 
one of the States, that State must be deemed as existing and 
having a constitutional place within the Union, whatever may 
be at any moment exactly its revolutionary condition. A State 
thus constituted cannot be deemed to be divided into two or 
more States simply by any revolutionary proceeding which may 
have occurred, because there cannot be constitutionally two 
or more States of Virginia. * * * The newly organized State 
of Virginia is therefore at this moment by the express con- 
sent of the United States invested with all of the rights of the 
State of Virginia and charged with all the powers, privileges and 
dignities of that State. If the United States allow to that 
organization any of these rights, powers and privileges it must 
be allowed to possess and enjoy them all. If it be a State 
competent to be represented in Congress and bound to pay taxes, 
it is a State competent to give the required consent of the State 
to the formation and erection of the new State of West Vir- 
ginia within the jurisdiction of Virginia. 

On the question of expediency, Mr. Seward said : "The 
first duty of the United States is protection to loyalty 
wherever it is found." He was of opinion also that ''the 
harmony and peace of the Union will be promoted by 
allowing the ISTew State to be formed and erected which 
will assume jurisdiction over that part of the valley of the 
Ohio which lies on the south side of the river, displacing 
in a constitutional and lawful manner the jurisdiction 
heretofore exercised by a political power concentrated at 
the head of the James River." 



OPIISriONS OF CABINET. 491 

Mr. Chase: In every case of insurrection involving the 
persons exercising the power of the State, when a large body of 
the people remain faithful, that body so far as the Union is 
concerned must be taken to constitute the State. It does not 
admit of doubt that the Legislature which gave its consent to the 
formation and erection of the State of West Virginia was the 
true and only lawful Legislature of the State of Virginia. The 
Madison papers clearly show that the consent of the Legislature 
of the original State was the only consent required to the erec- 
tion and formation of a new State within its jurisdiction. * * * 
Nothing required by the Constitution to the formation and ad- 
mission of West Virginia is therefore wanting; and the act 
of admission must necessarily be constitutional. Nor is this 
conclusion technical as some may think. The legislature of 
Virginia, it may be admitted, did not contain many members 
from the Eastern counties. It contained however, representa- 
tives from all counties whose inhabitants were not either rebels 
themselves or dominated by greater numbers of rebels. It was 
the only Legislature of the State known to the Union. If its 
consent was not valid, no consent could be. If its consent 
was not valid the Constitution as to the people of West Vir- 
ginia had been so suspended by the rebellion that a most import- 
ant right under it is utterly lost. 

The act is almost universally regarded as of vital im- 
portance to their welfare by the loyal people most immediately 
interested, and it has received the sanction of large majorities in 
both houses of Congress. These facts afford strong presump- 
tions of expediency. 

Mr. Stanton: I have been unable to perceive any point on 
which the act of Congress conflicts with the Constitution. By 
the erection of the New State the geographical boundary here- 
tofore existing between the free and slave States will be broken; 
and the advantage of this from every point of consideration sur- 
passes all objections which have occurred to me on the question 
of expediency. 

Mr. Welles: We cannot close our eyes to the fact that the 
fragment of the State which in the revolutionary tumult has in- 
stituted a new organization is not possessed of the records. 



492 THE REIS^DING OF VIEGINIA. 

archives, symbols, traditions or capital of the Commonwealth. 
Though calling itself the State of Virginia, it does not assume 
the debts and obligations contracted prior to the existing diffi- 
culties. Is this organization then really and in point of fact 
anything else than a provisional government for the State? It 
is composed almost entirely of those loyal citizens who reside 
beyond the mountains and within the prescribed limits of the 
proposed new State. In this revolutionary period, there being no 
contestants, we are compelled to recognize the organization as 
Virginia. Whether that would be the case and how the ques- 
tion would be met and disposed of were the insurrection this day 
abandoned, need not now be discussed. Were Virginia, or those 
parts of it not included in the proposed new State, invaded and 
held in temporary subjection by a foreign enemy instead of in- 
surgents, the fragment of territory and population which should 
successfully repel the enemy and adhere to the Union would 
doubtless during such temporary subjection be recognized, and 
properly recognized, as Virginia. When, however, this loj'^al 
fragment goes farther and not only declares itself to be Vir- 
ginia but proceeds by its own act to detach itself permanently 
and forever from the Commonwealth and to erect itself into a 
new State within the jurisdiction of the State of Virginia the 
question arises whether this proceeding is regular, legal, right 
and in honest good faith comformable to and within the letter 
and spirit of the Constitution. * * * Were there no question of 
doubtful constitutionality, the time selected for the division 
of the State is most inopportune. It is a period of civil com- 
motion, when unity and concerted action on the part of all loyal 
citizens should be directed to a restoration of the Union and all 
tendency towards disintegration and demoralization avoided. 

Mr. Blair: The question is only whether the State of Vir- 
ginia has consented. In point of fact it will not be contended 
that this has been done; for it is well known that the elections 
by which the movement has been made did not take place in 
more than one-third of the counties of the State, and the votes 
on the constitution did not exceed twenty thousand. The argu- 
ment for the fulfillment of the constitutional provisions ap- 
plicable to this case rests altogether on the fact that the govern- 
ment organized at Wheeling (in which a portion of the district 
in which it is proposed to create the new State is represented 



OPINIONS OF CABINET. 493 

with a few of the Eastern counties) has been recognized as the 
government of the State of Virginia for certain purposes by the 
executive and legislative branches of the Federal government; 
and it is contended that by these acts the Federal government 
is estopped from denying that the consent given by this gov- 
ernment of Virginia to the creation of the New State is a 
sufficient consent within the meaning of the Constitution. It 
seems to me to be a sufficient answer to this argument to say: 
first, that it is confessedly merely technical and assumes un- 
warrantably that the qualified recognition which has been given 
to the Government at Wheeling for certain temporary purposes 
precludes the Federal government from taking notice of the 
fact that the Wheeling government represents much less than 
half the people of Virginia when it attempts to dismember the 
State permanently. Or, second, that the present demand of 
itself proves the previous recognitions relied on to enforce it 
to be erroneous. For unquestionably the fourth article of the 
Constitution prohibits the formation of a new State within the 
jurisdiction of an old one without the actual consent of the old 
State; and if it be true that we have so dealt with a third part 
of the people of Virginia as that to be sustained we should now 
permit that minority to divide the State, it does not follow 
that we should persist, but on the contrary it demonstrates that 
we have heretofore been wrong; and if consistency is insisted 
on and is deemed necessary, we should recede from the position 
heretofore taken. 

As to the expediency of the measure, I do not think it either 
necessary to recede from those positions or proper to take the 
new step insisted on now. 

The opinion of Mr. Bates was lengthy and elaborate. 
The following extract will indicate the course of his ar- 
gument : 

Mr. Bates: We all know — everybody knows — that the gov- 
ernment of Virginia recognized by Congress and the President 
is a government of necessity, formed by that power which lies 
dormant in every people, which though known and recognized 
is never regulated by law because its exact uses and the occa- 
sions for its use cannot be foreknown, and it is called into 



494 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

exercise by the great emergency which overturning the regular 
government necessitates its action without waiting for the de- 
tails and forms which all regular governments have. It is in- 
tended only to counteract the treacherous perversion of the 
ordained powers of the State and stands only as a political 
nucleus around which the shattered elements of the old Com- 
monwealth may meet and combine in all its original proportions 
and be restored to its original place in the Union. It is a 
provisional government proper and necessary for the legitimate 
object for which it was made and recognized. That object was 
not to divide and destroy the State, but to rehabilitate and 
restore it. That Government of Virginia, so formed and so 
recognized, does not and never did in fact represent and govern 
more than a small fraction of the State — perhaps a fourth part. 
And the Legislature which pretends to give the consent of Vir- 
ginia to her own dismemberment is (I am credibly informed) 
composed chiefly if not entirely of men who represent those 
forty-eight counties which constitute the new State of West 
Virginia. The act of consent is less in the nature of a law 
than of a contract. It is a grant of power; an agreement to be 
divided. And who made the agreement? The representatives 
of the forty-eight counties with themselves. Is that fair deal- 
ing? Is that honest legislation? Is that a legitimate exercise 
of a constitutional power by the legislature of Virginia? It 
seems to me that it is a mere abuse, nothing less than an at- 
tempted secession, hardly valid under the flimsy forms of 
law. 

MR. LINCOLN UNANIMOUS. 

When Mr. Lincoln had weighed the opinions, pro and 
con, thns furnished him, he found reasons of his own to 
justify him in signino; the bill, and he put them on paper 
as a sort of deciding opinion in the case : 

The consent of the Legislature is constitutionally necessary 
to the bill for the admission of West Virginia becoming a law. 
A body claiming to be such Legislature has given its consent. 
We cannot well deny that it is such unless we do so upon the 
outside knowledge that the body was chosen at elections in 



PRESIDENT LINCOLN DECIDES. 495 

which a majority of the qualified voters of Virginia did not 
participate. But it is a universal practice in popular elections 
in all these States to give no legal consideration whatever to 
those who do not choose to vote as against the effect of the 
votes of those who do choose to vote. Hence it is not the 
qualified voters but the qualified voters who choose to vote that 
constitute the political power of the State. Much less than to 
non-voters should any consideration be given to those who did 
not vote in this case; because it is also a matter of outside 
knowledge that they were not merely neglectful of their rights 
under and duty to this government, but were also engaged in 
open rebellion against it. Doubtless among these non-voters 
were some Union men whose voices were smothered by the more 
numerous Secessionists; but we know too little of their num- 
ber to assign them any appreciable value. Can this government 
stand if it indulges constitutional constructions by which men 
in open rebellion against it are to be counted, man for man, 
the equals of those who maintain their loyalty to it? Are they / 
to be counted better citizens and more worthy of consideration 
than those who simply neglect to vote? If so their treason 
against the Constitution enhances their constitutional value. /^ 
Without braving these absurd conclusions, we cannot deny that 
the body which consents to the admission of West Virginia is 
the Legislature of Virginia. I do not think the plural form of 
the word "legislatures" and "states" in the phrase of the Con- 
stitution "without consent of the Legislatures and of the States 
concerned," etc., has any reference to the New State concerned. 
That plural form sprang from the contemplation of two or more 
old States contributing to form a new one. The idea that the 
New State was in danger of being admitted without its own con- 
sent was not provided against because it was not thought of,, # 
as I conceive. It is said the devil takes care of his own. Much ^ 
more should a good spirit — the spirit of the Constitution and the'?^ 
Union — take care of its own. I think it cannot do less and 
live. 

But is the admission of West Virginia into the Union ex- 
pedient? This in my general view is more a question for 
Congress than for the Executive. Still, I do not evade it. More 
than on anything else it depends on whether the admission or 
rejection of the New State would, under all the circumstances. 



\ 



496 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

tend the more strongly to the restoration of the National 
authority throughout the Union. That which helps most in 
this direction is the most expedient at this time. Doubtless 
those remaining in Virginia would return to the Union, so to 
speak, less reluctantly without the division of the old State, 
than with it; but I think we could not save as much in this 
quarter by rejecting the New State as we should lose by it in 
West Virginia. We can scarce dispense with the aid of West 
Virginia in this struggle; much less can we afford to have her 
against us in Congress and in the field. Her brave and good 
men regard her admission into the Union as a matter of life 
and death. They have been true to the Union under very 
severe trials. We have so acted as to justify their hopes and we 
cannot fully retain their confidence and co-operation if we seem 
to break faith with them. In fact they could not do so much 
for us if they would. 

Again, the admission of the New State turns that much 
slave soil to free; and this is a certain and irrevocable encroach- 
ment upon the cause of the rebellion. 
/ The division of the State is dreaded as a precedent. But 

a measure made expedient by war is no precedent for times of 
peace. It is said that the admission of West Virginia is seces- 
sion and tolerated only because it is our secession. Well, if we 
call it by that name there is still difference enough between 
secession against the Constitution and secession in favor of the 
Constitution. I believe the admission of West Virginia into the 
Union is expedient* 

THE SIGNING OF THE BILL. 

Granville Parker relates that happening to be East on 
private business and gathering from the papers "the crit- 
ical situation at Washington," he went thither on the last 
day of December and that evening called upon Hon. J. B. 
Blair, congressman from the Parkersburg district. Mr. 
Blair informed him he had just come from the President,, 
who had told him "to call next morning and receive a 
"New Year's gift." "In the morning," says Mr. Parker,, 



THE "odd trick. 



497 




Granville Paekeb. 

"Mr. Blair, as he afterwards told me, called at the Presi- 
dential mansion before the doors were open, went in at a 
window and met the President, who had jnst got up. He 
went immediately to a drawer and took out and showed 
Mr. Blair the bill for the admission of West Virginia, 
with his signature affixed, as the Xew Year's gift he had 
promised ; manifesting the simplicity and joyousness of a 
child when it feels it has done its duty and gratified a 
friend." 



HOW PRESIDENT I.INCOLN GAVE THE ODD TRICK. 

In a letter published in the Wheeling Intelligencer 
January 22, 1876, Mr. Blair relates that when the bill was 

Va.-3a 



498 THE EENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

in the hands of the President, accompanied by his col- 
league in the House, Hon. William G. Brown, and Senator 
Willey, he called upon the President in the interest of 
admission, and he describes what occurred as follows: 

We had hardly taken our seats when Mr. Lincoln remarked 
that he was glad we had called as he wished to talk with us 
as to the constitutionality and expediency of creating the pro- 
posed New State out of a part of the State of Virginia. With- 
out waiting for reply he went on to say that he had consulted his 
Cabinet on the above points, that he had their opinions in 
writing, that he would read them to us but would not tell us 
which was which. Friend Brown just then got in a word and 
remarked that he thought we would be able to tell whose 
opinion he read. We did so in every instance. He had the 
written opinion of every member of his Cabinet save that of 
Mr. Smith. Mr. Seward, Mr. Chase and Mr. Stanton were for 
us; Mr. Welles, Mr. Blair and Mr. Bates were against us. 

The President then pulled out a drawer in the table by 
which he was sitting with the remark: "Now, gentlemen, I will 
give you the "odd trick;" and I remarked "that is the trick we 
hope to take." One thing I do know that we three agreed after- 
wards that Mr. Lincoln's argument was the clearest, most 
pointed and conclusive of all. Above all, it was most satis- 
factory to us. We went at seven o'clock and left at ten. Just 
as we were leaving 1 obtained a promise from him that notwith- 
standing the next day was New Year's day, when the Presi- 
dent received no visitors on business, that if I would come up 
early he would let Mr. Brown know whether he had approved 
our bill or not. I was there early in the morning and he kept 
his promise — as he always did. He brought the bill to me 
and holding it open before my eyes, he said: "You see the 
signature." I read: "Approved — Abraham Lincoln." 



CHAPTER XXI. 

AMENDMENT MADE AND RATIFIED— WEST VIR- 
GINIA INAUGURATED. 

THE CONSTITUTION COMES BACK. 

January 14, 1863, the Schedule Commissioners issued 
a proclamation recalling the Constitutional Convention 
and ordering elections in Greenbrier, Monroe, Morgan, 
Pendleton and Pocahontas Counties, not before repre- 
sented, and to fill vacancies : 

In Ohio County, caused by the death of Gordon Bat- 
telle. 

In Marion, by the resignation of Hiram Haymond. 

In Mason, by the resignation of John Hall. 

In Kanawha, by the resignation of James H. Brown. 

The Convention reassembled in its former meeting- 
place at 11 A. M.^ February 12, 1863. Daniel Lamb was 
called to the temporary chair and Abraham D. Soper, a 
venerable looking white-haired man of 66 was made per- 
manent President. The following new members appeared, 
most of them at the opening of the session : x\ndrew F. 
Ross, Ohio County; James H. Brown, Kanawha (who 
had changed his mind and came back) ; Moses Tichenal, 



500 THE KENDING OF VIKGINIA. 

Marion ; Dr. David S. Pinnell, Upshur ; Joseph S. Wheat, 
Morgan; D. W. Gibson, Pocahontas; Andrew W. Mann, 
Greenbrier. 

Immediately upon the opening the first day, the com- 
missioners submitted their report including the passage 
of tlie act of admission with an amendment, to confirm 
which this Convention had been recalled. 

DEATH OF GORDON BATTELLE. 

Announcement of the death of Gordon Battelle while 
serving as chaplain of the 1st Union Virginia Regiment, 
was made by Mr. Lamb, who briefly eulogized his deceased 
colleague and offered resolutions of respect and condolence. 
Several members followed Mr. Lamb in feeling tributes to 
their late associate, testifying to his high personal char- 
acter, his valuable services in the Convention and the 
noble devotion to his country which cost him his life. One 
could not, while listening to these addresses, but reflect on 
the irony of fate. Gordon Battelle was the one man who 
might have been excused some satisfaction in the resum- 
moning of this Convention. Congress had refused admis- 
sion until the gradual emancipation he had sought to have 
incorporated should be put into the constitution. He had 
been gagged on the floor of the Convention on the motion 
of one of the commissioners who carried their unacceptable 
w^ork to Washington — denied permission to give his rea- 
sons; and now the Convention after a year's delay was 
brought back to repair the omission ; and the one man 
whose judgment had been vindicated was the one man 
chosen not to be here to receive this meed of justice. 



coi^stitutional coi^ventiolsr recalled. 501 

"congressional dictation" for home consu:mption. 

In the afternoon the Convention "was addressed at 
length by Senator Willey, who had brought a written ad- 
dress from Washington to show why West Virginia shoukl 
accept the condition imposed by Congress. The argument 
was superfluous, as all well-informed people knew. Out- 
side a few politicians, now eager to get on the winning- 
side, the people of West Virginia did not care a fig about 
the cry of "congressional dictation." All they wanted was 
a chance to vote for a free State. Mr. Willey was not un- 
willing to make a little capital for himself, first by taking 
all the credit of the emancij)ation amendment — which the 
record of the Senate debates shows he declared was "not 
personally agreeable" to him but which he was forced to 
stand sponsor for — and next at the expense of his unfaith- 
ful colleague. After reciting precedents and opinions to 
show that Congress had the right to impose conditions, he 
finally came down to Mr. Carlile saying: "I am happy, 
however, to be able to add to these high authorities that 
of my able colleague. I have here the original bill reported 
by the Committee on Territories for the admission of West 
Virginia into the Union, dra"\vn by Mr. Carlile. That it 
was the mature result of Mr. Carlile's enlightened judg- 
ment there can be no doubt;" and then he quoted the sar- 
castic remarks Mr. Wade had made regarding Mr. Carlile's 
course in the committee. This was keen on the part of 
Mr. Willey, but a little explanation of his own indifference 
and failure to uncover Mr. Carlile's Trojan horse, instead 
of leaving it to be done by others, might have been in bet- 
ter taste. 



502 THE KENDING OF VIIUilNlA. 

(H^MrEXSATKD EMATiTCTPA TIO.N. 

In the seeoiul day's session, Mr. Van Winkle offered 
for reference to a special connnittee a resolntion to engraft 
on the constitntion the ]>r()vision reqnired hv (\^nG;ress. 
T\\o conimiltec were dircclcd to iiuiuirc wlu'llicr any ]iro- 
vision in reference to the compensation of owners shonld 
or could with ])ro])ri(>ty he inscM'ted in the constitntion or 
adopted liy tlic Convention. Mr. Brown, of Kanawha, the 
special champion of the slave-hold iusi' interests, offered a 
res(dntion declarinn that "the claus(> ratifying and accept- 
ing the constitntion presci'ihed hy Congress ought also 
t(^ contain a ]n'ovision recpiiring the Legislature to nnike 
compensation to the loyal owners whose slaves shall be 
emancipated thereby, or at least be accomi>anied by an ex- 
])licit and positive declaration that the ratification and 
adoption of said condition shall not be construed as chang- 
ing in any degree the (Ith section of the constitution." 
That section ])nwided that "Private property shall not be 
taken for judjlic use without just comiHMisation. • No per- 
son in time of ])eace shall he deprived of life, liberty or 
]n'0]i(>rty without due process of law.'' 

ooMMirrKK uKToirr on tt. 

Tlu> special committee was eonii)osed of Van "Winkle, 
Willey, lirown. of Kanawha, Lamb and Parker; and the 
following day Mr. ^'an Winkle submitt(Ml their report. 
The committee had Ikhmi unabl(> to learn that any State had 
emancipated slaves in being at thc^ time of passing the 
enumcipation law. "Tt is conceded on all hands," the re- 
port said, "that no prospective or other right of property 



COMPENSATKI) K.MANLirATlON. 503 

attaches to the cliiklrcu of slave mothers until aetually 
born, who cannot therefore be subjects of emancipation.'" 
The counuiltcc found no precedent in this counlrv to servo 
as guide in forming their opinions as to whether the own- 
ers of slaves in being at the time the constitution goes into 
operation and then under the age of twenty-one years, 
should be coni])ensated for their slaves. In colonies of 
England, France, Denmark and Holland, emancipation of 
slaves had been accompanied by compensation to owners; 
and in the liberation of the Russian serfs, the Emperor 
had ])ro\-ided for compensation to owners of the lands to 
which they were attached and to whom their services were 
due. Regarding the constitutional ])rovision quoted, that 
private property should not be taken — which same pro- 
vision is found in the Constitution of the United States — 
the committee' proceeded to inquire to what extent these 
provisions were applicable to the present case. They 
thought slaves and the right to their service constituted 
such proi)erty as was contemplated in this provision, and 
concluded that freeing slaves was e(iuivalent to taking the 
property ''for public use;" and that therefore the owners 
of slaves in being at the time the constitution goes into 
operation and enuuicipated under it would be entitled to 
compensation. The details of this would be matter for the 
Legislature. The connnittee did not, however, recom- 
mend any alteration beyond that required by Congress. 
They accompanied their report with a resolution express- 
ing the opini(m "that the owners of slaves in being at the 
time the constitution goes into effect and emancipated 
under its provisions will be constitutionally and legally 
entitled to recover from the State the actual value of such 
slaves at the time of emancipation." 



t504 THE EENDING OF VIKGINIA. 

Later J Mr. Brown, of Kanawha, offered a resolntion 
requesting Congress to appropriate $2,000,000 to the State 
of West Virginia, to be paid in United States 6 per cent, 
bonds on the passage of an act abolishing slavery within 
the first year after the establishment of the State and mak- 
ing compensation to owners. 

The debates on this question of compensation were 
the most considerable that engaged the attention of the 
Convention during its sitting. 

On the 17th the resolutions reported by the special 
committee on the subject of compensation were taken up 
and Mr. Willey offered in lieu of them one declaring it the 
opinion of the Convention that "every right of every kind 
of property is amply provided for and secured by the con- 
stitution as it stands," and that no amendment was neces- 
sary or proper. Mr. Wheat had offered an amendment to 
the committee's resolution providing that the appropria- 
tion for the compensation should be "made from moneys 
arising from the sale of rebel property and not from the 
taxes imposed on Union slaveholders." 

COMPENSATION "tUKNED DOWN." 

When it came to a vote both Mr. Wheat's amendment 
and Mr. Willey 's substitute were laid on the table, carry- 
ing with them the whole question of compensation. 

AMENDMENT ACCEPTED. 

Then the simple resolution reported by the committee 
to insert in the constitution the provision required by Con- 
gress in place of section 7 of Article XI, was adopted by 



CONSTITUTION AMENDED. 505 

■unanimous vote, only two members being absent. Next 
morning the constitution as thus amended was readopted 
by a vote of 52 to none. 

For an exact understanding of what was done let it 
be stated : The provision which Congress had required to 
be stricken out was this : 

7. No slave shall be brought, or free person of color be 
permitted to come, into this State for permanent residence. 

The provision required to be inserted was the follow- 
ing: 

7. The children of slaves born within the limits of this 
State after the fourth day of July, eighteen hundred and sixty- 
three, shall be free; and all slaves within the said State who 
shall at the time aforesaid be under the age of ten years shall 
be free when they arrive at the age of twenty-one years; and 
all slaves over ten and under twenty-one years shall be free 
when they arrive at the age of twenty-five years; and no slave 
shall be permitted to come into the State for permanent 
residence therein. 

RECCED OF DEBATES. 

At this point Mr. Van Winkle made another effort to 
secure a record of the debates. He offered a resolution 
''authorizing" the Executive Committee to contract with 
the person who had preserved a report of the debates for 
their transcription, and for future publication if the com- 
mittee saw fit. The Convention cut out the authority to 
publish but authorized the committee to contract for hav- 
ing the debates written out. But the authority was never 
exercised. 



506 THE EEXDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

ORGANIZI2^G THE XEW STATE. 

The last day of the session an ordinance was passed 
"for the organization of the State of West Virginia." It 
provided that on Thursday next succeeding the thirty- 
fifth from the date of the President's proclamation under 
the act of admission, an election for State and county offi- 
cers should be held throughout West Virginia. The Exec- 
utive Committee were entrusted with the details of holding 
the election and of providing for the accommodation of 
the Legislature and executive officers at the city of Wheel- 
ing. It was provided that the Legislature on the sixty- 
first day after the date of the President's proclamation 
should meet at eleven o'clock in the forenoon and proceed 
to organize. All officers acting within the State by author- 
ity of the laws of Virginia were to continue the exercise of 
the powers and duties of their offices in the name of West 
Virginia until officers chosen under the new constitution 
were elected or appointed and qualified to succeed them. 

The Convention adjourned February 20th, subject to 
recall by the Executive Committee ; but if not previously 
convened it was to stand adjourned from the date the New 
State was organized and in operation, and Mr, Dille was 
appointed Vice President to act in the contingency of the 
death of the President. 

AMENDMENT RATIFIED BY THE PEOPLE. 

The amended constitution was submitted to vote March 
26, 1863, and the amendment ratified by 18,862 to 514. 
This vote did not include the volunteers in the United 
States army, roundly stated at ten thousand. 



POLITICIAN'S GET IN LINE. 507 

POLITICIANS MANOEUVKING. 

Eeeurring to the informal vote on Mr. Battelle's eman- 
cipation provision when the constitution was first sub- 
mitted, there were then reported 610 votes against it. ISTow 
in the whole State on a formal vote the number against 
was a hundred less. The informal vote of six thousand 
for in a few counties had grown under legal submission 
of the question to nearly nineteen thousand in favor of a 
stronger provision. Emancipation would have been just as 
heartily ratified in 1862 as in 1863. The politicians had 
been frightened at a bogey of their own raising. They 
were afraid somebody else might be afraid. Public opin- 
ion in West Virginia was not afraid of the question. The 
people of the State were ready to accept emancipation — 
eager to do so-r-as giving their new State its fitting status 
at home and before the world, — From first to last, the old- 
time politicians who had formerly controlled public opin- 
ion were fighting the advance of the free State and re- 
treating before its irresistible march. Finally, they saw 
there was nothing for them but to fall in with the vic- 
torious column ; and with their accustomed assurance they 
took their places at the front, assumed the leadership and 
appropriated the glory and emoluments of victory. 

An address issued by the Committee on Revision and 
Engrossment after the adjournment of the Convention, 
like the one Mr. Willey brought out from Washington, 
was a work of supererogation. It sought to prove what 
there were few to deny. It set up men of straw and then 
skillfully knocked them down. It assumed that an objec- 
tion pervaded the State to "Congressional dictation ;" that 



508 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

there was a deep-seated affection for slavery and unwilling- 
ness to see it removed even in the gradual way provided. 
The simple, obvious, common-sense fact was that — save a 
few politicians, and they only for captandum — nobody 
cared a fig about "Congressional dictation," and few 
about slavery. The great body of the people who were 
loyal to the United States were far ahead of them on 
that question and anxious to be rid of the negro institu- 
tion as quickly as possible. These gentlemen sought to 
make it appear that what had come to pass was of their 
doing, when in truth it had come in spite of them, through 
force of a growing public opinion which they were never 
able to catch up with. 

THE FREE-SOIL ANTISEPTIC. 

The free-soil sentiment in Northwestern Virginia was 
the salt that saved the mess from putresence. Let this be 
emphasized, for it is the immortal truth. It was the efforts 
of the free-soilers like Campbell and Peirpoint, Atkin- 
son, Paxton, Woodward, the l^ortons, the ITornbrooks, 
Battelle, Stevenson and others like them, which carried 
the State through the snares and besetments of chicane 
and treachery — over honest opposition and dishonest 
friendship — which won the way in Congress over doubts 
and misgivings about regularity and legality. It was sym- 
pathy with these anti-slavery men which enlisted Bing- 
ham, the "Old Man Eloquent" of the House. As Camp- 
bell once told the Convention in his paper, the anti-slavery 
men were the only friends the ISTew State had in Congress ; 
and a pretty figure we should have cut but for their favor. 



NEW STATE PROCLAIMED. 509 

THAT "compromise." 

The address last referred to erred in stating that "a 
compromise clause was agreed on" regarding slavery in 
the Constitutional Convention. The adoption of the 
clause was not a compromise. There was an apparent co- 
operation between Pomeroj of Hancock and Benjamin II. 
Smith to shelve Battelle's proposition, and adopt the negro- 
exclusion clause only, ' as a sort of settlement. Pomeroy 
made the suggestion, and Smith, representing the pro- 
slavery element, seconded by Brown of Kanawha, accepted 
the trick and assumed it to be an overture for compromise ; 
and then Dille took it upon himsolf to rise in the role of 
"bless you my children" and make everybody happy. Xo 
intelligent spectator on or off the floor was deceived by this 
play of pretenee. Neither Mr. Pomeroy nor Mr. Dille 
had any authority except his own to offer any "com- 
promise." Mr. Battelle, the only member who had any- 
thing to compromise, expressly disclaimed all part in it. 
He declared he "entered into no compromise on this ques- 
tion," and that there had been nothing to give the matter 
the dignity of a compromise. There had been simply an 
application of the gag, and Mr. Battelle so felt it and pro- 
tested against it. Xor should it be forgotten that the 
clause adopted with so much gush was the one Congress 
required the Convention to take out, because in forbidding 
free negroes to come into the State it trenched on the rights 
of citizens of the United States. 

THE PRESIDENT PROCLAIMS. 

A copy of the amended constitution was certified by the 
President of the Convention (countersigned by the Execu- 
tive Committee) to the President of the United States; 



510 THE KEJS'DING OF VIRGINIA. 

and on the 19tli of Aj^ril President Lincoln issued his 
proclamation declaring the admission of West Virginia 
completed, to take effect, according to the terms of the act 
of admission, sixty days thereafter. 

SENATOR CARLILE PLAYS HIS LAST CARD, 

Senator Carlile had mean-vvhile not been willing to 
confess defeat. On the 14th of February, 1863, he intro- 
duced in the Senate a bill "supplemental to the act for 
the admission of West Virginia, &c." In this he provided 
that the proclamation of the President should not be is- 
sued until the counties of Boone, Logan, Wyoming, Mer- 
cer, McDowell, Pocahontas, Raleigh, Greenbrier, Monroe, 
Pendleton, Fayette, J^icholas and Clay, "now in posses- 
sion of the so-called Confederate government and over 
which the restored government of the State of Virginia 
has not yet extended or expressed, have voted on and rati- 
fied the conditions contained in" the act of admission. 
The bill was referred to the Judiciary Committee, who 
reported adversely. February 28th, Mr. Carlile tried to 
have the bill taken up for consideration, but the Senate 
refused by a vote of 28 to 12. Thus the last card in the 
unfaithful Senator's game was played in vain. 

It must not be supposed that Mr. Carlile was alone 
in these efforts to defeat the ISTew State. As having evi- 
dent connection with his course in the Senate, it is a curi- 
ous fact that there stands on the records of the Legislature 
of the restored government an act passed February 4, 
1863, providing for elections on the 4th Thursday of May 
succeeding, on the question of annexing to West Virginia 



NEW STATE WRECKERS DISCOMFITED. 51t 

the following districts outside the boundaries fixed in the 
constitution : 

1. Tazewell, Bland, Giles, Craig. 

2. Buchanan, Wise, Russell, Scott, Lee. 
O-J 3. Alleghj^ij, Bath, Highland. 

4. Frederick and Jefferson. 

5. Clark, Loudon, Fairfax, Alexandria, Prince Will- 
iam. 

6. Shenandoah, Warren, Page, Rockingham. 

The act gave consent in advance that any or all these 
districts might be annexed to the New State; and pro- 
vided that if the condition of the country did not permit 
an election at that time, the Governor should as soon as it 
would permit, order such election. It is apparent Mr. 
Carlile had coadjutors at the home end of the line. Such 
action indicates a plasticity on the part of the Legislature 
that does them no credit. If they desired to promote the 
admission of West Virginia, this was a singular way to do 
it. If they sought to protect the integrity of Virginia, 
this was a peculiar way to do that ; for the success of this 
scheme would have left the old Dominion but a fragment 
of its once broad domain. 

THE NEW STATE WRECKERS WHO FAILED. 

Mr. Parker asserts positively that it was the deliberate 
plan of the pro-slavery leaders in West Virginia "to wreck 
the ISTew State project upon a failure to harmonize" the 
constitution "with the views of Congress on slavery." 
This appears to be the key to their attitude in the Consti- 
tutional Convention, — to send a constitution to Washing- 



512 THE KEXDIXCt of VIRGINIA. 

ton which they knew Congress would not accept. Evi- 
dently Mr. Parker thinks Mr. Willey's careful avoidance 
of all allusion to the informal expression of the people in 
regard to emancipation, in his address when presenting 
the memorial, was in consonance with this plan. Mr. 
Parker was active in pushing the vote on the emancipation 
question in the Southwest when the first vote was taken on 
the constitution; and regarding the action of Bro^vn of 
Kanawha and Hall of Mason, he makes these statements : 

If they really desired a New State, why did they contend 
in the Convention for taking in the whole valley with 60,000 
slaves, with which Congress could never have been reconciled? 
Why refuse to submit the gradual emancipation clause to the 
decision of the people? Why were James H. Brown and John 
Laidly, while holding courts in Wayne and Cabell counties all 
the time warning the people against having anything to do with 
the subject; reiterating what every sane man knows to be false, 
that such an expression was unnecessary to secure admission by 
Congress. Why should John Hall, President of tjie Conven- 
tion, visit Ceredo during that court and hold consultation with 
Brown and Laidly? Why should James H. Brown advise 
Colonel Lightburn to suppress all expression in his regiment on 
the subject? Why did James H. Brown advise the people at 
Barboursville that it would do much hurt, and that it was only 
a scheme of ambitious demagogues? Why did John Laidly come 
before the commissioners while holding the election at 
Guyandotte, pale and shaking with rage, while the people were 
I voting for the clause, and declare the instruction to be un- 
authorized and improper, and use all the means in his power to 
suppress their expression on the subject? All these things I 
stand ready to prove by unimpeachable witnesses. 

WAYS AND MEANS. 

February 3, 1863, the Legislature of restored Vir- 
ginia passed an act transferring to the Xew State when. 



INSTALLATION OF WEST VIRGINIA. 513 

it came into being, all the interest of Virginia in property, 
unpaid and uncollected taxes, fines, forfeitures, penalties 
and judgments, within the territory embraced in West Vir- 
ginia ; and the following day made an appropriation of 
$150,000 and of whatever balances might on the 20th of 
June remain in the treasury shown on the Auditor's books 
as belonging to the counties included in the Xew State. 

WEST VIRGINIA INAUGURATED. 

June 20, 1863, witnessed the installation of the new 
Commonwealth. The Linsley Institute building, at the 
corner of Fifth and Center streets, in the city of Wheeling, 
had been prepared as a temporary capitol for the use of 
the Legislature and Executive. In front of the building 
a platform had been erected, draped in the j^ational 
colors ; and upon this the Governor and other State officers 
chosen at the elections held b}' the commissioners of the 
Convention, nnder auspicious skies of a bright June morn- 
ing, in the presence of a great and joyous assemblage col- 
lected on the adjacent streets and grounds, assumed the 
obligations of their several stations ; following which the 
two houses of the Legislature withdrew to their respective 
chambers and organized for the laborious task of framing 
new statutes to make effective the new charter of their free- 
dom and indejDendence. 

The dream of generations had "come true." Some 
whose hopes and labors had been croAvned were not here to A 
enjoy the fruition. At last we had come to the end of the 
toilsome road ; the close of the fierce, the bitter, the en- 
during struggle ; had triuniiDhed over perils by land and 

Va.-33 



514 THE REiS^DING OF VIRGINIA. 




The First Capitol of West Virginia. 



MONTANI SEMPER LIBERI. 



515 



sea, by flood and field — the assaults of open, the snares of 
secret, foes — the timidity of the faint-hearted, the rash- 
ness of the bold. At last we were out of the wilderness ; 
not only in sight but in possession of the promised land. 
The past, with its anxieties and bitterness, was to be for- 
gotten save for its lessons of wisdom and patience; and 
now all faces turned to the future, rosy in the dawn of en- 
franchisement and progress ! 




CHAPTER XXII. 

THE SECESSION CONVENTION DESCRIBED BY SUR- 
VIVING MEMBERS. 

AS SEEN BY m'gREW OF PRESTON. 

Hon. James C. McGrew of Kingwood, West Virginia^ 
was a member of the Richmond Convention of 1861, col- 
league of Hon. William G. Brown. He is now at the age 
of eighty-eight the president of a bank in active service, 
the possessor of a large property which he cares for, and 
is more active and capable than many men at fifty. Learn- 
ing that Mr. McGrew was still in good health and activity, 
the author wrote him in June, 1900, to ask if he would 
contribute for these pages his recollections and impressions 
of the Convention and of some of the Western members. 
His reply (written on type-writer with his own hand) was 
addressed to the author ; and except the address is given 
without alteration. The day he mailed it, Mr. McGrew 
says in a P. S., he completed his eighty-seventh year. 

Kingwood, W. V., September 14. 1900. 

Not until now, since writing you in July, have I been able 
to command sufficient leisure to fulfill the promise to tell you 
something about the Virginia Secession Convention; and now 
that I have set myself about it, I find that I cannot be sure of 
entire accuracy in stating facts which occurred near forty years 
ago; having to depend largely on a memory somewhat im- 
paired by age. I believe a full and complete report of the 

616 



THE SECESSION CONVENTION. 



517 



- 


i 


■ -l^t 


'^ **^«k 




"''■*^^' • ^^^^^ 


1 

1 



James C. McGrew. 



proceedings of the Convention, including the many able speeches, 
has never been published. It would be interesting reading now. 

Although there existed great dissatisfaction in the western 
part of the State growing out of the inequality of taxation, there 
was no demand among the people at the time for an extra ses- 
sion of the General Assembly. Under the Constitution, that 
body sat biennially, and the winter of 1860-61 was the period of 
vacation. Various reasons for convening the Legislature were 
given in the Governor's proclamation — such as "State legisla- 
tion," "ratification of the sale of the James River and Kanawha 
Canal to a body of French capitalists," and " to take into con- 
sideration the condition of public affairs." These were mere 
pretexts, the sole purpose being to open the way to secession 
of the State. 

The calling of the Convention was in open disregard of 
well-established precedents and was clearly a usurpation. Never 
before in the history of the State had a State Convention been 



518 TllK KENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

called for any purpose without the question being first submitted 
to a vote of the people and sanctioned by a majority of the 
voters. There was no demand by the people at the time for a 
convention; and there is no room for question that at the time 
the legislature passed the bill requiring the Governor to issue 
his proclamation calling a convention, it was known to the se- 
cession conspirators with a good degree of certainty that a large 
majority of the good people of Virginia were opposed to seces- 
sion; and that if the question of holding a Convention for the 
purpose of considering the right and expediency of the State to 
secede from the Union and join the Southern Confederacy were 
submitted to the voters, there would be a large majority against 
it. At the then recent presidential election, the electoral vote 
had been carried for Bell, the candidate of the Whig party; and 
when the members of the Convention came together it was as- 
certained that out of the number one hundred and fifty-two, 
eighty-five were adherents of Bell: the remainder being almost 
equally divided between Douglas and Breckenridge. 

When the bill authorizing the Convention to be called was 
under consideration in the House of Delegates, a proposition 
was submitted to first take a vote of the people. This was 
fiercely opposed and defeated by the Secessionists. It did not 
accord with the wicked plans of the conspirators to consult the 
wishes of the people; they had determined that nothing should 
stand in the way of their diabolical purpose to carry the State 
out of the Union. This was declared by that arch conspirator, 
Henry A. Wise, when in the first speech he made in the Con- 
vention he made this declaration: "It is perfectly immaterial, 
gentlemen, whether you carry the State out of the Union by 
ordinance or not. If you do, it is well: if you do not, we will 
carry her out by fire and sword; and by all the gods, ye shall 
have tvar!" 

The Convention assembled on the 13th of February; and 
it soon became apparent that there was a large preponderance 
of sentiment among the members in favor of Virginia remaining 
in the Union. This was made manifest in some degree by the 
election of John Janney, a Union man, over Valentine W. 
Southall, a Secessionist, President of the Convention by a vote 
of 70 to 54, and was confirmed in a degree by the vote on a 



THE SECESSION COXVENTION. 519 

i-esolution thanking John J. Crittenden — which was fiercely re- 
sisted by Henry A. Wise — for his efforts in the United States 
Senate to bring about an adjustment of the then existing na- 
tional difficulties; which vote stood 108 for and 16 against. 

John Janney had been all his life a Whig, but had never 
been prominent in politics; and consequently was unfamiliar 
with the devious way of politicians. It has been said of him 
that he was "a man of pure heart, undoubted probity, and 
possessed of great practical wisdom." In his remarks on tak- 
ing the chair he alluded to the "important position Virginia 
had occupied in framing the Constitution and forming the Union 
of the States." He said that under that instrument many 
blessings had been enjoyed, and feelingly alluded to the "old 
flag" then floating above them, which he trusted would remain 
on the capitol of Virginia forever." The Union men felt en- 
couraged. 

On the 16th, in obedience to a resolution passed the previous 
day, the President proceeded to appoint a "Committee on Federal 
Relations." to which should be referred all resolutions touching 
Federal relations and kindred subjects. Unacquainted with 
most of the members and their opinions on the subject of seces- 
sion. President Janney readily accepted such suggestions as the 
conspirators saw proper to make regarding appointments on 
this Committee; hence its composition is readily accounted for — 
fourteen Secessionists and seven Unionists. It was composed 
of the following: Robert Y. Conrad, Henry A. Wise, Robert E. 
Scott, William Ballard Preston, Lewis E. Harvie, W. H. Mc- 
Farland, William McComas, Robert L. Montague, Samuel Price, 
Valentine W. Southall, Waitman T. Willey, James C. Bruce, 
William W. Boyd, James Barbour, Samuel C. Williams, Timothy 
Rives, Samuel McDowell Moore, George Blow, Jr., Peter C. John- 
son, John B. Baldwin, John J. Jackson — 21. 

Resolutions — some by Union members, but mostly by Seces- 
sionists — were rapidly offered and referred. Those offered by 
the latter, while expressing divers sentiments and great re- 
gard for the Constitution and the Union, generally found the 
remedy for what they called existing wrongs in secession of the 
State; and they bore such a strong resemblance to each other in 
verbal construction as to create a suspicion that they had a 
common origin in the councils of the secession cabal and had 



520 THE REXDIXa OF VIKGIXIA. 

been put into the hands of their friends from different sec- 
tioES of the State for presentation so that they might have the 
greater effect on the minds of weak Union members. 

The plans of the conspirators were adroitly laid, and suc- 
cessfully put into operation. They evidently knew from the 
beginning that they would have a strong Union sentiment to 
combat in the Convention and to overcome, if possible. A part 
of the machinery prepared for this purpose was the introduction 
to the Convention, five days after it met, of three commissioners 
from Georgia, South Carolina and Mississippi: Henry L. Ben- 
ning, John S. Preston, and Fulton Anderson; each of whom ad- 
dressed the Convention, evidently by pre-arrangement with the 
conspirators. These addresses were eloquent, especially that of 
Benning; and not only eloquent but adroit. He appealed to 
the passions of his hearers and to their pride as Virginians; and 
pictured in glowing colors what their State would surely be- 
come as a member of the Southern Confederacy. He promised 
honor to her sons and prosperity to the State; security against 
the North for the institution of slavery, and many other things. 
The addresses had their intended effect on the minds of a num- 
ber of Unionists, producing some defection from their ranks, 
but not sufficient to overcome their majority or to make it safe 
for the conspirators to relax their efforts further to deplete it. 

On the 9th of March the Committee made a partial majority 
report in which "sovereignty" was declared to "rest in the 
States," slavery was held to be "a vital element in Southern 
socialism," and any interference by State or Federal government 
was offensive and dangerous. The eighth resolution claimed it as 
"the right of the people of the States for just causes to withdraw 
from their association under the federative head, and to erect 
new governments; and that the people of Virginia would never 
consent that the Federal power should be exercised for the pur- 
pose of subjecting the people of such States to the Federal 
authority." The ninth resolution recognized the right of the 
Gulf States to secede; and the eleventh resolution contained a 
threat that if certain demands named in other of the resolutions 
were not complied with by the Federal government, then Vir- 
ginia would resume the powers granted under the Constitution 
of the United States "and throw herself upon her reserved 
rights." 



THE SECESSION CONVENTION. 521 

This committee report, which was made on the 14th of 
March, was made the order of the day in committee of the 
whole and at once became the signal for a general onset between 
the Union men and the Secessionists. The debate began at once 
and continued for about twenty-two days. It was characterized 
by great heat and great ability on both sides. The vehemence 
and malignancy of the conspirators was met by the sturdy deter- 
mination and eloquence of the Unionists in defense of all that 
was revered in the history of the country, and all that went to 
make the country prosperous and strong and the people con- 
tented and happy. The resolutions were voted on separately. 
Some were stricken out, others amended on a basis generally 
favorable to the Union cause. 

During the contest, a Secessionist offered a substitute for 
the sixth resolution providing that an ordinance of secession 
from the Federal Union should be submitted to the people of 
Virginia at the annual election in the following May. This 
proposition was defeated by a vote of forty-five for and eighty- 
nine against. The Unionists were elated by the result of their 
fierce contest, which seemed to show such a decided opposition to 
disunion: but it aroused the conspirators to greater activity 
than before, if such were possible. 

Alarmed at the strength of the Union sentiment in the 
Convention, the conspirators had early in the session quietly 
sent out instructions to their friends in the several counties and 
boroughs in which Union delegates had been elected by small 
majorities to hold meetings and pass resolutions instructing 
their delegates. Accordingly reports were sent in from thirty- 
seven counties and boroughs purporting to be the proceedings of 
largely attended meetings of constituents of Union members, 
instructing — and even commanding — them to favor secession 
measures and vote for an ordinance of secession. These pre- 
tended proceedings of public meetings were uniformly read in 
open Convention and referred to the Committee on Federal Rela- 
tions. Some of the weaker members were deceived by this 
device and gave in their adhesion to the cause of secession. 
Notwithstanding these defections, the friends of the Union 
still had the majority, and the conspirators found it necessary 
to adopt still other methods to overcome it. Accordingly a secret 
circular, signed by six of the conspirators who were members of 



522 THE REXDIXG OF VIKGIXIA. 

the Convention, and two who were members of the House of 
Delegates, was sent throughout the State to such of the citizens 
as they thought they could rely upon to cooperate with them, 
requesting them in significant language to present themselves 
in Richmond on the 16th day of April, to "consult with the 
friends of Southern rights as to the course Virginia should pur- 
sue in the present emergency; and to send from each county 
a full delegation of reliable men." This brought to the city 
hundreds, if not thousands, of desperate characters, who were 
prepared to do the bidding of the cabal, whatever it might be. 

The purpose of the conspirators in this cannot be misunder- 
stood when viewed in the light of subsequent events, which 
were made to take place as links in the chain of combinations 
which had brought about such a disordered state of public 
affairs, and which was designed to accomplish secession even 
without the semblance of the forms of law. 

This camarilla, thus brought together, held meetings behind 
closed doors in a hall not far away from the capitol. where the 
Convention was sitting, to which none but the faithful were 
admitted, whilst the conspirator Wise and his co-conspirators 
alternated between the two bodies, no doubt keeping the revolu- 
tionary meeting accurately informed of everything that trans- 
pired in the lawful one, although the latter was sitting in secret 
and the members were under their parole of honor to disclose 
none of its proceedings. This rabble was not in Richmond for 
any lawful purpose, but for that of carrying out. if need be, 
Wise's threat, made early in the session of the Convention, 
which I have already quoted; and there can be not the slightest 
room for doubt that if the Convention had refused on the 17th 
to pass the ordinance of secession, it would have been violently 
thrust out of the capitol and the revolution begun. 

The conspirators had early adopted a system of tactics 
calculated and intended to arouse the passions of the "lewd 
fellows of the baser sort," who at once began to carry out the 
devilish plan, and were soon joined by others of the more 
respectable classes of the populace; and soon the city became a 
perfect pandemonium. Howling mobs paraded the streets at 
night, with drums and horns and cow-bells, "frightening the ear 
of night" with discordant noises; going from place to place, 
denouncing with opprobious epithets the Unionists of the 



THE SECESSION CONVENTIOlSr. 523 

Convention, one of whom they burned in effigy in the street, 
others of whom they tried to intimidate by suspending ropes 
with nooses attached to limbs of trees or lamp-posts near their 
lodgings at night, calling them from their beds and kindly 
informing them that the halters were for them! Until the 
Convention went into secret session, the lobbies and galleries 
of the hall were crowded with this same excited, angry mob — 
hounded on by negro-traders — who hissed and howled whilst 
Unionists were speaking, sometimes compelling them to desist. 
Upon leaving the hall, Union members were sure to encounter 
a similar mob in greater numbers about the door outside, who 
would greet them with insulting remarks, sometimes with 
threats of personal violence. No epithet milder than "sub- 
missionist" or "black Republican" found a place in their vocab- 
ulary of abuse. 

This state of affairs continued up to the passage of the ordi- 
nance of secession, the mob continually increasing in numbers 
and violence. From every place in the city except the capitol 
the National flag was torn down and dishonored and that of 
the Southern Confederacy hoisted in its stead. Small Confeder- 
■ ate flags were suspended from the windows and balconies of 
many of the houses, so that Union members passing aloiig the 
streets to and from their lodgings would be compelled to undergo 
the humiliation of walking under the secession emblem or take 
to the middle of the street. So well was this understood that 
the mud of the street was frequently preferred to the alterna- 
tive. John F. Lewis, a sturdy Union man (now dead), as brave 
as the bravest, uniformly left the pavement for the street when 
passing, making long strides, and often denouncing in no meas- 
ured or polite terms the tricks and devices used to insult and 
if possible intimidate. 

After the flag of the Union had disappeared from every 
other place in the city, it was kept permanently floating from 
the dome of the capitol, not being lowered when the Conven- 
tion was in session, as had been previously done. When the 
"reliable men" began to assemble, they found to their disgust 
the stars and stripes floating from the flag-staff on the capitol. 
This they could not tolerate. Convenient access to the top of 
the building could be had only through a single door, which 
led from the library to the third story. This door was kept 



524 THE KE]^Di:XG OF VIEGHSTIA. 

locked by the librarian. One evening, immediately after the 
Convention adjourned, the mob rushed in through the library, 
and with axes hewed down the door and went on up to the 
roof. The flag was violently torn down, amid yells of the mad- 
dened crowd below, and the secession emblem hoisted in its 
place — the canaille cheering as it arose. From that time on the 
Convention sat under it. 

The newspapers of the city were for secession, and freely 
joined the mob in abuse of the Unionists. About this time there 
appeared in the Charleston Courier the following significant 
paragraph: 

"If there are any among us who yet consider South Carolina 
not in earnest or in the right, it is full time they seek safety in 
a more congenial climate. Those who are not for us are against 
us, and we can and shall take care of ourselves." 

This was copied by the Daily Enquirer, which added the 
following: 

"If there are about Richmond or anywhere else in Virginia, 
any persons occupying the position described in the above extract 
from the Courier, they will consult their own interest and safety 
by seeking a more congenial climate at the earliest possible 
moment. A hint to the considerate is all sufficient. Those who 
are not considerate must take the consequences." 

By methods such as these a number of Union members were 
dragooned into supporting the cause of the conspirators, while 
others were seduced into a shameful betrayal of their constitu- 
ents, some by flattery and some by even more disreputable 
means. Thus what was a decided Union majority when the 
Convention first came together gradually melted away. 

While these scenes were being enacted, a special messenger 
was despatched to Charlston, South Carolina, to announce to 
the leaders there that everything was in readiness in Virginia 
for the final act, and that they (the Carolinians) must strike 
the first blow, and in an hour thereafter "by Shrewsbury clock" 
Virginia would be with them! This was a welcome announce- 
ment to the secession leaders. Preparation to begin the con- 
flict had already been made, and the bombardment of Fort 
Sumter began immediately — April 12th — and on the day follow- 
ing Governor Pickens, in a telegram, boastingly conveyed the 
tidings to Governor Letcher declaring "War commenced, and 



THE SECESSION CONVENTION. 525 

we will triumph or perish." The telegram was read in the 
Convention, and the news it conveyed soon found its way to 
the public, producing intense excitement both in the Convention 
and in the city; adding fresh fuel to the flame which, in a 
large portion of the populace, had already consumed every patri- 
otic sentiment of regard for the Constitution and the Union. 
The city was illuminated; bonfires were lighted in the streets 
and public squares; stores, offices and public places were closed; 
and the populace thronged the streets to give vent to their feel- 
ings of rejoicing and of hatred of those who were known to 
be opposed to secession. The throngs in the streets were largely 
increased in numbers by strangers who rushed to the city from 
the surrounding country to join in the wild orgies of a mad- 
dened people rushing on to ruin — a seething mass of humanity 
— a veritable hell! 

On the 16th of April the Convention went into secret ses- 
sion. This increased the excitement and added to the alarm 
among the remaining Unionists. Scenes rarely witnessed in a 
deliberative body in the history of civilized governments were 
being enacted in the hall where the Convention was sitting. 
The Union men could now comprehend fully their hopeless 
position, when they saw those who had been elected as Unionists 
and who earlier had acted and voted with them, yielding to 
the storm so furiously raging about them and beating about 
their heads. In vain was every appeal to their sense of duty 
to their constituents, their patriotism, their manhood. They 
had yielded to the satanic influences about them, and had no 
power to retrace their steps. 

On the morning of the 17th, Henry A. Wise came into the 
hall, carrying a large horse-pistol, which, with a flourish, he 
placed before him on his desk, and proceeded to harangue the 
Convention in the most vehement and denunciatory manner; 
and, looking at his watch, he declared that at that very hour 
events were occurring "which caused a hush to come over his 
soul." It was then the Union men of the Convention saw clearly 
the object of the other assemblage which had been, and was 
then, sitting with closed doors, and whose concealed hand was 
in the act of seizing the reins of government, leaving them the 
form without the power to resist. 



526 THE EENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

It was at this juncture that W. T. Willey, with all the fer- 
vency of his noble nature, and the burning eloquence of which 
he was a master, and the zeal of a patriot, made his last thrill- 
ing appeal to his colleagues to stand by the Constitution and 
the Union. During its delivery, there was seen all over the 
hall old men, with the frosts of winter on their heads, sobbing 
like children. But this and similar efforts were unavailing. A 
few days before the Committee on Federal Relations had re- 
ported "An Ordinance to repeal the ratification of the Constitu- 
tion of the United States of America by the State of Virginia, 
and to resume all rights and powers granted under said Con- 
stitution." On the afternoon of the 17th of April, the Convention 
came to a vote on the ordinance. The vote stood eighty-eight for 
and fifty-five against. Subsequently at different times the fol- 
lowing members asked and obtained leave to record their votes 
for the ordinance: John R. Kilby, Addison Hall, John Q. Marr, 
Robert E. Grant, Alfred M. Barbour and Allen C. Hammond; 
and the following at different times asked and obtained leave 
to change their votes from the negative to the affirmative; W. 
C. Wickham, Algernon S. Gray, Hugh M. Nelson, Alpheus F. 
Haymond, George W. Berlin and George Baylor — and possibly 
others in the list. 

Attached to the ordinance was a schedule providing for a 
vote to be taken upon it at the May election; and accordingly 
a vote was taken on the day fixed upon by the schedule. But 
wherefore? The State had been already turned over by the 
Convention to the Southern Confederacy before the schedule 
was prepared and attached to the ordinance. Its enactment was 
only another of the many acts of duplicity of which the conspira- 
tors were guilty. There was no waiting for this vote to be 
taken and the result fairly ascertained. The conspirators had 
secured the passage of an ordinance of secession, and its pur- 
pose must be carried out whether ratified by a majority of the 
voters or not. The people were not to be taken into the account. 

Robert E. Lee had been conferred with even before the 
passage of the ordinance, and he was now promptly appointed 
commander-in-chief of the naval and military forces of the 
State, and accepted. A committee on military affairs and a 
military advisory board had been appointed, military officers 
commissioned; companies and regiments enlisted and organ- 



THE SECESSIOlSr COXVEXTION. 527 

ized; rebel troops were found in many of the counties; actual 
war existed in the State, and war upon the loyal inhabitants. 

Many of the newspapers of the State (notably the Richmond 
Enquirer) threatened confiscation of property and personal vio- 
lence to any who dared to oppose secession; the State was in a 
turmoil; the Union people were bewildered, intimidated, and 
comparatively few of them voted; and, as was to be expected, 
a majority in favor of ratifying the ordinance was reported by 
the Secessionists at Richmond. 

At the time these events were transpiring, persistent efforts 
were made — and are still occasionally made — to create the belief 
that the people of Virginia were in favor of seceding from the 
Union at the time the Convention was called; and that a major- 
ity of the votes of the State was cast at the May election in favor 
of ratification. What this vote was will most likely never be 
known with exactness by the public. It is possible there was a 
majority of the votes cast in favor; but it was a majority of 
a minority of the entire voting strength of the State. What- 
ever it was, I regard the figures published at Richmond un- 
worthy of belief except in so far as they show that a minority 
only of the entire vote was polled. Had a majority of all the 
votes of the State been cast against ratification, it would have 
availed nothing. Already the Convention had (April 25th) 
"ratified" the constitution of the Confederacy and entered into 
a union with it. 

I think it appropriate to this communication to quote what 
the Baltimore American said at the time regarding the Con- 
vention and the result of its action, brought about by the 
"inauguration of mob violence and a reign of terror": 

"In "Virginia, the fairly and legally expressed wishes and 
opinions of an overwhelming majority have been openly and 
wantonly violated and disregarded. A State Convention upon 
which was conferred power only to submit propositions to the 
people has betrayed the trust confided to it, bartered away the 
most sacred rights of the people of the State, and actually 
invested another government with absolute military control and 
dictatorial power over the inhabitants of the Old Dominion. 
By the action of this body of traitors to their constituents, Vir- 
ginia has been disfranchised, the prerogatives of the people 
have been nullified, the expressed will of an overwhelming 



628 THE RENDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

majority has been overridden by fi-aiid and force and treason; 
and under the flimsy pretext of avoiding coercion to obedience 
to the Federal Constitution and laws, the State has actually been 
subjugated by a miserable junta of reckless politicians and her 
people made subjects and hewers of wood and drawers of water 
for a despotic oligarchy of broken-down Democratic politicians." 

The secession ordinance was passed in the afternoon of the 
17th of April, as I have already stated. Late in the afternoon 
of Saturday, the 20th, some one made the quiet suggestion that 
the Union members from the Northwestern part of the State 
get together for consultation, and the Powhattan Hotel, near 
the capitol, was named as the place of meeting. Accordingly, 
about twenty, who were hastily notified, quietly and promptly 
met in Sherrard Clemens' bedroom in the hotel, and organized 
by electing Gen. John J. Jackson (father of the present United 
States District Judge of the same name) chairman. After care- 
ful deliberation, the meeting decided unanimously that the mem- 
bers present, and such other Union members from the western 
counties as might be willing to join in the movement (leav- 
ing only two in the Convention to give information), should 
quietly withdraw from the Convention, go home to their con- 
stituents, call public meetings, put on foot measures to resist 
secession, and ultimately bring about, if possible, what had long 
been talked about and desired — a division of the State. 

John S. Carlile, who life was thought to be in danger, had 
been taken by some of his friends the previous day and put 
on board a railway train and started for his home; and a few 
other Union members had already left the city. It had now 
become necessary for those intending to leave to procure per- 
mission from the Governor in order to procure railway tickets 
and get out of the city. Eight members went in a body to 
the Governor for this purpose, and after being sharply inter- 
rogated, a permit signed by the Governor was given them. 
They were informed by the Governor that they could not get 
out over the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, as he had given orders 
the night before to burn the bridge over the Potomac at Har- 
per's Ferry. 

On Sunday morning, the 21st, a party of foui'teen (including 
two ladies), after encountering some difficulty, got out of the city 
by two railroads. When they arrived at Alexandria in the 



THE SECESSION COIs^VENTIOlSr. 529 

afternoon, they found the city in an uproar — streets guarded, 
all public conveyances by land and water discontinued; and 
consequently they were compelled to remain over night. James 
Burley managed to elude the guard in the late evening and 
made his way on foot to Washington, where the writer found 
him next morning at the railway station, sitting on a wheel- 
barrow, smoking his pipe, apparently very happy to be out of 
"Dixie," and once more under the protection of the stars and 
stripes. 

It soon became known that a party of "Black Republicans," 
trying to make their way out of the State, were stopping at 
Green's Mansion House. About ten o'clock, after the guests 
of the hotel had retired, and the night clerk and the writer 
were in the office, arranging about a missing trunk, six or eight 
great rough fellows came rushing into the place and proceeded 
at once to examine the hotel register, inquiring of the clerk 
the political status of each guest, and making uncomplimentary 
remarks about those known to be Union men. When they came 
to the name of W. T. Willey, they inquired: "How about this 
fellow?" The clerk replied: "I don't know; there is a member 
of the Convention," pointing to myself; "he can tell you." To 
their inquiry I replied: "He is all right." Their response 
was: "Damn him, he had better be, or he goes into the Poto- 
mac before morning." Whereupon they proceeded to discuss the 
proposition made by one of their number to put the entire party 
in the river, and do it without delay. Finally a postponement 
was decided upon, and the mob left the hotel without attempt- 
ing to carry their threat into execution. Under these conditions 
I thought prudence required that I give information to my 
friends, members of the party, of what I had just witnessed, 
and to provide in the best way I could for my own personal 
safety. The party chose to remain and await developments. 
I informed my colleague, Hon. W. G. Brown, of my purpose to 
leave the city, if I could, at an early hour in the morning, and 
suggested that he accompany me; but he decided to remain. 
I left Alexandria next morning at two o'clock for Washington, 
in a buggy with a brisk team driven by a white man who was 
well known in the city. We were stopped in the suburbs once 
by the guard, but had no further difficulty until we reached the 
Long Bridge over the Potomac, which we found guarded by a 

Va.-34 



530 THE EEXDi:^G OF VIRGINIA. 

battery of artillery- There we were again halted and closely 
interrogated by the officer in command, and finally allowed to 
proceed. After two or three slight adventures in Baltimore and 
at Harper's Ferry, I reached home the third day after escaping 
from Richmond, worn in body and sick at heart. 

The party that remained at Alexandria were not permitted 
to come on to Washington, but were compelled to turn their 
faces again toward Richmond. Instead of returning to Rich- 
mond, when they reached Manassas Junction, they left the rail- 
way train and hired conveyances across the mountain to Win- 
chester, whence they traveled by rail to Harper's Ferry and so 
on home. I do not now remember the names of all who were in 
this party, but I do remember W. T. Willey and his wife, Ches- 
ter D. Hubbard, James Burley, George McC. Porter, Campbell 
Tarr, Caleb Boggess, William G. Brown, Marshall M. Dent, John 
J. Jackson, Chapman J. Stuart, and, I think, John S. Burdett, 
and myself. 

Some time in the summer of 1863 I met, in Wheeling, W. H. 
B. Custis, a Union member of the Convention from Accomac, 
of whom I inquired what he thought would have been the result 
had not the Union members from the Northwest escaped from 
Richmond as they did. His reply was: "I think they would not 
have hung you, but you would be in Richmond now." 

About two months, June 14th, after the hegira of the North- 
western members, B. F. Wysor, member from Pulaski, offered a 
resolution, which was promptly adopted, instructing the Com- 
mittee on Elections, of which A. F. Haymond was chairman, 
to inquire and make report of the number and names of mem- 
bers whose seats were vacant, and the cause of such vacancies. 
Six days later. Chairman Haymond reported, among other 
things, that — 

"It appearing to the satisfaction of the Committee that 
William G. Brown, James Burley, John S. Burdett, John S. Car- 
lile, Marshall M. Dent, Ephraim B. Hall, Chester D. Hubbard, 
John J. Jackson, James C. McGrew, George McC. Porter, Chap- 
man J. Stuart, Campbell Tarr and Waitman T. Willey have been 
engaged in conspiracy against the integrity of the Common- 
wealth of Virginia, and are now engaged in aiding and abetting 
the open enemies of Virginia; therefore, 



THE SECESSION COXVEXTIOX. 531 

"Resolved, That the said William G. Brown (and the others 
named above) be and are hereby expelled from the Convention." 

When the resolution was taken, the names were voted on 
separately and all were expelled except Mr. Willey, whose case 
was recommitted, and, I believe, never again reported. This 
probably grew out of Raymond's personal regard for Mr. Willey. 
Caleb Boggess and Sherrard Clemens were expelled afterwards. 
By some sort of fiction, others were declared elected to fill the 
vacancies thus created, all of whom were Secessionists, of course, 
and all were admitted to seats, and all signed the ordinance, 
and their names appear on the numerous copies distributed 
throughout the country as though they were original members, 
lawfully elected; and they go to swell to that extent the claim 
of the Secessionists that the people of the State were in favor 
of separation from the Federal Union. 

In answer to some of the questions in your letter of June 
27th: 

I have no knowledge of how many members of the Conven- 
tion were living when John Goode, Jr., wrote the article pub- 
lished in the Washington Conservative Magazine, to which you 
refer in your letter; nor do I know the number now living; 
but it must be very small, as most if not all of them were then 
past middle age, and more than the life of a generation has 
passed since. Goode was a rabid Secessionist, and could not 
be expected to write without a strong bias upon the subject of 
secession. I have not seen the article referred to. Goode was 
the man whom Jubal A. Early challenged while he (Early) was 
a professed Unionist, for some offensive language used by Goode 
in one of his speeches. Goode said he meant no offense; Early 
said he was not mad — and there was no blood spilt. 

Governor Letcher may have been "a Union man at heart," 
as he claimed to have been in his interview with Burdett after 
the war was ended, and possibly was; but it looks like a 
"death-bed repentance." He gave some slight evidence of his 
respect for the Union in his proclamation convening the Gen- 
eral Assembly in extra session, January 7, 1861, in which, after 
declaring the Union "already disrupted," placing the blame on 
the North, and asserting that "South Carolina, a sovereign 
State, had a right to adopt the line she had chosen" — that is, 



532 THE KEXDIXG OF VIKGINIA. 

secede — he discussed the proposition for a call of a State Con- 
vention to determine the position Virginia should take, and 
declared his firm conviction to be in opposition to the measure; 
that no necessity existed for it; nor did he conceive that any 
practical good would be accomplished by it; and then he apol- 
ogized for the opinion! Letcher was weak in moral courage. 
His proclamation was an anomalous one; and it was thought at 
the time by some that it had been forced from him by the seces- 
sion cabal, and that a refusal would have gone hard with him. 
Having yielded to the first demand of the conspirators, he con- 
tinued (perhaps unwillingly) their tool to the end. 

George W. Summers was a man of extraordinary ability. 
He did valiant battle in the Convention for the Union; but 
as you know, he gave little encouragement to the Western move- 
ment, and literally no aid. He lacked one essential quality of a 
leader in emergencies — courage. 

John S. Carlile was a Douglas Democrat — elected as a 
Unionist to the Convention — and tried to represent his constit- 
uents as such, but entertained strong pro-slavery opinions; 
was in favor of maintaining the Federal Union, but it must be 
a Union with negro slavery guaranteed by the Constitution 
and the laws; and he was anti-coercion. Early in the session he 
offered this: 

"Resolved, That since the decision of the Supreme Court 
of the United States in the case of Chisholm vs. The State of 
Georgia, and the adoption of the Eleventh Amendment to the 
Constitution, we are at a loss to understand how the impression 
that the Federal government possessed the power to coerce a 
State could have obtained credence." 

You know what his course was in the Convention at Wheel- 
ing and in the United States Senate, when the admission of the 
new State was under discussion in that bodJ^ 

Caleb Boggess was elected by the Unionists of Lewis County 
and was true to his constituents in his votes in the Convention, 
voting uniformly with his Union colleagues. He was, I believe, 
a true manly man. 

I remember little of George W. Berlin. He was elected by 
a Union constituency and voted against the secession ordinance. 
He continued a member of the Convention to its final adjourn- 
ment, December 6, 1861. 



THE SECESSION CONVENTION. 533 

John N. Hughes was elected as a Unionist, but proved recre- 
ant to his trust. Seduced by the blandishments of the con- 
spirators, he voted for the ordinance of separation. He was a 
man of some ability. After he came from the Convention, while 
trying to escape from some Union soldiers whom he supposed 
to be in pursuit of him, he suddenly came in contact with a 
company of rebel troops, and, mistaking them in the dark for 
Union soldiers, proclaimed himself a Union man; whereupon 
he was shot and killed. Such was the story of his taking off, 
as told at the time. 

Benjamin Wilson was regarded as lacking the courage of 
his convictions. He was not active in the proceedings of the 
Convention. His attention was directed more to matters relating 
to the government of the State than to its secession from the 
Union. He appeared quite willing that the State should remain in 
the Union, but wanted reform in its constitution and laws; and 
at the same time had no particular objection to the State seced- 
ing, providing it were done without his vote. In his attempt 
to stand neutral, he was regarded with a lack of confidence by 
both parties. He had left the Convention previous to the 22nd of 
November, and on that day a resolution was introduced instruct- 
ing the Committee on Privileges and Elections to inquire into 
the cause of his absence and also that of Boggess and Clemens. 
Upon the report of the Committee, Boggess and Clemens were 
expelled; but the Committee reported that it had "no evidence 
of the disloyalty of Benjamin Wilson, nor to explain the cause 
of his absence from the Convention, and they ask to be dis- 
charged from further consideration of the case of Benjamin 
Wilson." 

It is stated above that the case of W. T. Willey was recom- 
mitted to the Committee on Elections, and never again reported 
— which is literally true; but I find that on the 16th of Novem- 
ber, Mlers W. Fisher offered this resolution, which was adopted: 

"Resolved, That Waitman T. Willey be and he is hereby 
expelled as a member of this body on account of his disloyalty 
to the Confederate States and his adherence to the enemies of 
the same." 

You had a personal knowledge of all the important events 
which transpired in the western portion of the State from 
the time the Union members returned until the State of West 



534 THE EEISTDING OF VIEGIlSriA. 

Virginia was organized, and for some years thereafter. I need 
not, therefore, mention them here. 

After some little research, the foregoing has been written 
somewhat hastily; and while it may contain a few immaterial 
errors as to statements of facts, it will be found substantially 
correct. In addition to these eleven sheets, I send you lists 
of names — one of members of the Virginia Convention, the 
other the names of those who voted for and against the ordi- 
nance of secession. Both are authentic, as I have original 
copies. 



Kingwood, W. Va., September 19, 1900. 
Soon after writing you on the 14th I received your esteemed 
favor of the 12th, with magazine article by John Goode, Jr. I 
have given the article a hasty perusal and find it to be cleverly 
written, and plausible withal, but lacking in candor — I might 
say, truthfulness. Let me quote one statement: "It is a great 
mistake to suppose that so far as Virginia was concerned the 
war between the States was waged for the purpose of perpetu- 
ating slavery." For what, then, was it waged? "Was it simply 
for the purpose of making good the claim that the State had 
the right under the Constitution to withdraw at her will from 
the Federal Union? Hardly. If it were not to secure the 
"right" to perpetuate slavery in the States where it existed, 
and to carry it into the Territories and "perpetuate" it there, 
what was it? What did the Committee on Federal Relations 
mean by appending to their report on the 9th of March the pro- 
posed amendment to the Constitution of the United States so 
thoroughly to perpetuate slavery in the States whei'e it then 
existed, and permitting it to be established in the Territories 
north of 36' 30", and forbidding its abolition in the District 
of Columbia, and requiring fugitive slaves escaping into free 
States to be returned to their owners by legal enactment? What 
other "right" were they proposing to fight for? I know the 
South threatened nullification because of the tariff, and wanted 
free trade; but could that be called a "right"? It is too late 
(or, I ought to say, too early) in the history of these times for 
Mr. Goode or any other defender of African slavery, and the 
war of the rebellion, to inculcate the belief that slavery was 



LIST OF MEMBEKS. 535 

not the moving cause of Virginia secession as well as that of all 
the so-called slave States; and next to that was the unholy 
ambition of Southern politicians, who saw political power in 
the general government slipping away from them. 



MEMBERS OF THE VIRGINIA STATE CONVENTION. 

(secession convention) 1861. 

Accomac William H. B. Custis. 

Albemarle Valentine W. Southall, 

James B. Holcombe. 

Alexandria George W. Brent. 

Alleghany and Bath Thomas Sitlington. 

Amelia and Notaway Lewis E. Harvie. 

Amherst Samuel M. Garland. 

Appomattox Lewis D. Isbell. 

Augusta A. H. H. Stuart, 

' John B. Baldwin, 

George Baylor. 

Barbour Samuel Woods. 

Bedford William L. Goggin, 

John Goode, Jr. 

Berkeley Edmond Pendleton, 

, Allen C. Hammond. 
Botetourt and Craig Fleming B. Miller, 

W. W. Boyd. 

Braxton, Nicholas and Clay Benjamin W. Byrne. 

Brooke Campbell Tarr. 

Brunswick James B. Mallory. 

Buckingham William W. Forbes. 

Cabell William McComas. 

Campbell John M. Speed, 

Charles R. Slaughter. 

Caroline Edmund T. Morris. 

Carroll F. L. Hale. 

Charles City, Jersey City and 

New Kent John Tyler. 

Charlotte Wood Bouldin. 



536 THE KENDING OF VIKGINIA. 

Chesterfield James H. Cox. 

Clarke Hugh M. Nelson. 

Culpeper James Barbour. 

Cumberland and Powhattan. . . . William C. Scott. 

Dinwiddle James Boisseau. 

Doddridge and Tyler Chapman J. Stuart. 

Elizabeth City, Warwick, York 

and Williamsburg Charles K. Mallory. 

Essex and King and Queen Richard H. Cox. 

Fairfax Richard H. Dulany. 

Fauquier Robert E. Scott, 

John Q. Marr. 

Fayette and Raleigh Kenry L. Gillespie. 

Fluvanna James M. Strange. 

Franklin Jubal A. Early, 

Peter Saunders, Sr. 

Floyd Harvey Deskins. 

Frederick Robert Y. Conrad, 

James Marshall. 

Giles Manilius Chapman. 

Gloucester John T. Seawell. 

Goochland Walter D. Leake. 

Gilmer, Wirt and Calhoun C. B. Conrad. 

Grayson William C. Parks. 

Green and Orange Jeremiah Morton. 

Greenbriar Samuel Price. 

Greensville and Sussex J. R. Chambliss. 

Halifax Thomas S. Flournoy, 

James C. Bruce. 
Hampshire Edward M. Armstrong, 

David Pugh. 

Hancock George McC. Porter. 

Hanover George W. Richardson. 

Hardy Thomas Maslin. 

Harrison John S. Carlile, 

Benjamin Wilson. 

Henrico Williams C. Wickham. 

Henry Peyton Gravely. 

Highland George W. Hull. 

Isle of Wight Robert H. Whitfield. 



LIST OF MEMBEES. 537 

Jackson and Roane Francis P. Turner. 

Jefferson Alfred M. Barbour, 

Logan Osburn. 
Kanawha George W. Summers, 

Spicer Patrick. 

King George and Stafford Edward Wallar. 

King William Fendall Gregory, Jr. 

Lancaster and Northumberland. Addison Hall. 

Lee John D. Sharp. 

Lee and Scott Peter C. Johnson. 

Lewis Caleb Boggess. 

Logan, Boone and Wyoming . . . James Lawson. 
Loudon John Janney, 

John A. Carter. 

Louisa William M. Ambler. 

Lunenburg W. J. Neblett. 

Madison Angus R. Blakey. 

Marion Alpheus F. Raymond, 

Ephraim B. Hall. 

Marshall ; James Burley. 

Mason James H. Couch. 

Matthews and Middlesex Robert L. Montague. 

Mecklenburg Thomas F. Goode. 

Mercer Napoleon B. French. 

Monongalia Waitman T. Willey, 

Marshall M. Dent. 
Monroe Allen T. Caperton, 

John Echols, 

Montgomery William Ballard Preston. 

Morgan Johnson Orrick. 

Nansemond John R. Kilby. 

Nelson Frederick M. Cabell. 

Norfolk City George Blow, Jr. 

Norfolk County William White, 

J. (J. Holladay. 

Northampton Miers W. Fisher. 

Ohio Sherrard Clemens, 

Chester D. Hubbard. 

Page Peter B. Borst. 

Patrick Samuel G. Staples. 



538 THE EENDING OF VIKGINIA. 

Pendleton Henry H. Masters. 

Pocahontas Paul McNeil. 

Petersburg Thomas Branch. 

Pittsylvania William T. Sutherlin, 

William M. Treadway. 
Pleasants and 

Ritchie Cyrus Hall. 

Preston '. . William G. Brown, 

James C. McGrew. 

Prince William Eppa Hunton. 

Princess Anne Henry A. Wise. 

Prince George and Surry Timothy Rives. 

Pulaski Benjamin F. Wysor, 

Putnam James W. Hoge. 

Randolph and Tucker John N. Hughes. 

Rappahannock Horatio G. Moffet. 

Richmond City William H. Macfarland, 

Marmaduke Johnson, 

George W. Randolph. 
Richmond County and Westmore- 
land John Critcher. 

Roanoke George P. Tayloe. 

Rockbridge Samuel McD. Moore, 

James B. Dorman. 
Rockingham Samuel A. Coffman, 

John F. Lewis, 

Algernon S. Gray. 

Russell and Wise William B. Aston. 

Scott Colbert C. Fugate. 

Shenandoah Samuel C. Williams, 

Raphael M. Conn. 

Smyth James W. Sheffey. 

Southampton John J. Kindred. 

Spotsylvania John L. Marye, Sr. 

Taylor John S. Burdett. 

Tazewell William P. Cecil, 

Samuel L. Graham. 

Upshur George W. Berlin. 

Warren Robert H. Turner. 

Washington Robert E. Grant, 

John A. Campbell. 



VOTE ON THE ORDINANCE. 



539 



Wayne Burwell Spurlock. 

Wetzel Leonard S. Hall. 

Wood John J. Jackson. 

Wythe Robert C. Kent. 

Prince Edward John T. Thornton: — 152. 

The following named members of the Virginia State Con- 
vention, which assembled in the City of Richmond February 13, 
1861. voted for the ordinance of secession, April 17, 1861. 



William M. Ambler, 
William B. Aston, 
James Barbour, 
Angus R. Blakey, 
George Blow, Jr., 
James Boisseau, 
Peter B. Borst, 
Wood Bouldin, 
William W. Boyd-, 
Thomas Branch, 
James C. Bruce, 
Frederick M. Cabell, 
John A. Campbell, 
Allen Caperton, 
William P. Cecil, 
John R. Chambliss, 
Manilius Chapman, 
Samuel A. Coffman, 
Raphael M. Conn, 
James H. Cox, 
Richard H. Cox, 
John Critcher, 
Harvey Deskins, 
James B. Dorman, 
John Echols, 
Miers W. Fisher, 
Thomas S. Flournoy, 
William W. Forbes, 
Napoleon B. French, 



Peter C. Johnson, 
Robert C. Kent, 
John J. Kindred, 
James Lawson, 
Walter D. Leak, 
William H. McFarland, 
Charles K. Mallory, 
James B. Mallory, 
John L. Marye, Sr. 
Fleming B. Miller, 
Horatio G. Moffatt, 
Robert L. Montague, 
Edmund T. Morris, 
Jeremiah T. Morton, 
William G. Neblett, 
Johnson Orrick, 
William C. Parks, 
William Ballard Preston, 
George W. Randolph, 
George W. Richardson, 
Timothy Rives, 
Robert E. Scott, 
William C. Scott, 
John T. Seawell, 
James W. Sheffey, 
Charles R. Slaughter, 
Valentine W. Southall, 
John M. Speed, 
Samuel G. Staples, 



540 



THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 



Samuel M. Garland, 
H. L. Gillespie, 
Samuel L. Graham, 
Fendall Gregorj% Jr. 
William L. Goggin, 
John Goode, Jr. 
Thomas F. Goode, 
F. L. Hale, 
Cyrus Hall, 
Leonard S. Hall, 
Lewis E. Harvie, 
James P. Holcombe, 
John N. Hughes, 
Eppa Hunton, 
Lewis D. Isbell, 
Marmaduke Johnson, 



James M. Strange, 
William T. Sutherlin, 
George P. Tayloe, 
John T. Thornton, 
William T. Tredway, 
Robert H. Turner, 
John Tyler, 
Edward Waller, 
Robert H. Whitfield, 
Samuel C. Williams, 
Henry A. Wise, 
Samuel Woods, 
Benjamin F. Wysor — S 
Franklin P. Turner, 
Addison Hall— 1—89. 



Ben Wilson of Clarksburg, Harrison County, was excused 
from voting at his own request. 

The following members of the Virginia Convention voted 
against the ordinance of secession, — April 17, 1861. 



John Janney, (president.) 
Edward M. Armstrong, 
John B. Baldwin, 
George Baylor, 
George W. Berlin, 
Caleb Boggess, 
George W. Brent, 
WMlIiam G. Brown, 
John S. Burdett, 
James Burley, 
Benjamin W. Byrne, 
John S. Carlile, 
John A. Carter, 
Sherrard Clemens, 
C. B. Conrad, 
Robert Y. Conrad, 
James H. Couch, 



Alpheus F. Haymond, 
Chester D. Hubbard, 
George W. Hall, 
John J. Jackson, 
John F. Lewis, 
William McComas, 
James C. McGrew, 
James Marshall, 
Samuel McD. Moore. 
Henry H. Masters, 
Hugh M. Nelson, 
Logan Osburn, 
Spicer Patrick, 
Edmund Pendleton, 
George McC. Porter^ 
Samuel Price, 
David Pugh, 



COMMENT BY BUEDETT. 541 

W. H. B. Custis, John D. Sharp, 

Marshall M. Dent, Thomas Sitlington, 

William H. Dulany, Burwell Spurlock, 

Jubal A. Early, Alexander H. H. Stuart, 

Colbert C Fugate, Chapman J. Stuart, 

Peyton Gravely, George W. Summers, 

Algernon S. Gray, Campbell Tarr, 

Ephraim B. Hall, William White, 

Allen C. Hammond, Williams C. Wickham, 

James W. Hoge Waitman T. Willey, — 55. 
J. G. Holladay, 

The members named below did not vote: 

John Q. Marr, 
Peter Saunders, Sr. 
Thomas Maslin, 
Benjamin Wilson, 
Alfred M. Barbour, 
'♦Addison Hall, 
Paul McNeil, 
John J. Kindred, 
Robert E. Grant, — 9. 

♦Addison Hall, subsequently asked and obtained leave to 
record his vote in favor of the ordinance and preamble. 



CRISP COMMEXT BY BUEDETT OF TAYLOE. 

Hon. John S. Burclett, who was a member of the Vir- 
ginia Convention of 1861 from Taylor County, is an- 
other of the few survivors of that body. He is now resi- 
dent at the West Virginia capital, past his 8 2d year, in 
good health and faculty. He was one of the most fearless 
and determined of the loyal Virginians in the Convention, 
and one of the most active and outspoken, after the return 



542 



THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 




John S. Burdett. 



of the delegates from the Northwest, in organizing resist- 
ance to its edicts, as references and quotations made else- 
where amply show. Mr. Burdett received at the handa 
of President Lincoln appointment as Captain and Quar- 
termaster, and served with credit and distinction with the 
Army of the Potomac. The author wrote him about the 
first of May, 1900, making inquiry for his recollection 
on some doubtful points and received a reply dated May 
5th, written in characteristic vein and showing that the 
writer of it was "chipper and peart" as many a man 
twenty years his junior. In this letter Mr. Burdett makes 
this allusion to Mr. Carlile: 



THE EXODUS FROM EICHMOXD. 543 

Now, in regard to the portentous and dark days of the 
rebellion, I cannot say much that will be useful to you, but I 
will say I was thar from its inception to its Appomattox, taking 
part in early discussions and meetings looking to the restoration 
of the government of Virginia, culminating in aiding to form 
West Virginia; this completed while serving as Captain in the 
Army of the Potomac, with an honorable appointment from the 
immortal Abraham Lincoln, and confirmed by the United States 
Senate. Carlile was a member and voted for my confirmation. 
Poor Carlile! died in Clarksburg; turned against the New 
State bill and lost all his glory of the Rebellion by denying the 
record in the matter. With all his faults, I love his memory. 
Much about him to commend. So drop a tear and let him go. 

Mr. Burdett continues : 

My connection and history with the rebellion was outspoken 
and bold, and elicited bitter denunciation from the Richmond 
press, the Enquirer denouncing me as "the execrable, damnable 
Burdett, whom we missed capturing at Phillippa, and, had we 
got him, would have spent no time guarding him." Well, I am 
here, thank God, to repeat the story how they did not "got" me; 
but we got a saved country and a new map of Virginia, minus 
gallant West Virginia — a glorious outcome of the villainous 
effort to destroy the greatest nation on earth. 

The ordinance was passed on the 16th of April, and we 
recalcitrants lit out on first trains we could catch — some twelve 
or fifteen of us — Carlile, Clemens, Dent and others. A dispatch 
from Governor Letcher failed to arrest us at Fredericksburg. 
When we got to Washington, some went North. I came to my 
home on the Baltimore & Ohio, and John Seddon and Alf. Bar- 
bour sat in my front, with bottles of whiskey. When they saw 
me, they said: "Burdett, you seceded at Richmond, did you?" 
They were members and on the way to Harper's Ferry to grab 
the armory and open up revolutionary devilment. Barbour 
was a member from Jefferson County, in which Harper's Ferry 
is situated. 

My good wife reminds me, while attempting to write you, 
that I could have written a book of interest of the times from 
regular letters sent her during service of three years in the 



544 THE RENDING OF TIRGIXIA. 

war; but when I moved from my old house in Pruntytown, I 
burned all up, and left others to do our memory justice. I am 
seldom mentioned. Others take the cake and the credit of resist- 
ance to secession in the Convention at Richmond and formation 
of the New State. I was one of five — Campbell Tarr, Crothers, 
John Shuttlesworth of Clarksburg (forget the other) — who, in 
1861, went up to Wellsburg and landed those two thousand guns 
on the Island at Wheeling. I proposed it. Old Burdett is forgot- 
ten. Be it so. Excuse egotism. It is the offhand effusion of an 
old veteran. 

After receipt of his first letter, I asked Mr. Burdett 
to give me a more detailed account of the exodus from 
Richmond, and any other points of interest about the Con- 
v^ention he could recall, asking him particularly about 
Hughes of Randolph, who had been one of my teachers and 
of whose tragic death I had never been able to get a defi- 
nite account. In a second letter, written May 21st, Mr. 
Burdett says: 

You allude to the time and manner of our leaving Rich- 
mond after the passage of the ordinance. Well, a day or two 
before the 16th we were threatened with an assault from the 
opposition on the floor of the Convention if we did not pass 
the ordinance; but ascertaining that gold and bribery, negro 
traders, faro banks, gamblers and other villainous appliances 
had reversed majorities so that they had eighty secession against 
fifty-six opposed — when we met at first the loyal Union men 
had eighty against rebel fifty-six — after the passage of the ordi- 
nance, on the 16th, on the morning of the 17th, the loyal ele- 
ment of West Virginia hustled for their lives: and each fel- 
low, leaving clothes in wash^ found his way to the first train on 
Broad street, via Fredericksburg, etc., for home. We scattered 
at Washington and Baltimore, in different directions, by differ- 
ent lines, some via Pittsburg. I went it alone and made for 
the Baltimore & Ohio for my home at Pruntytown, near Grafton. 

At Harper's Ferry I found great excitement. The platform 
was black with a frenzied crowd. John Seddon and Alf. Barbour 



THE ATTITUDE OF LETCHER. 545 

were on the train, and plenty of whiskey bottles in front of 
them. They soon recognized me, and said: "Burdett, you se- 
ceded — eighty for and fifty-six against?" "Well," said I "what 
about the injunction of secrecy?" No reply. Thinks I to myself: 
I will see whether I have any locks on my mouth to keep rebel 
secrets from loyal West Virginia. 

So, you see, we got to Wheeling in a scattering manner, 
and soon found about four hundred brown-fisted fellows in 
Wheeling, cogitating ways and means of resistance to the rebell- 
ion. Went home and sent up regular delegates into Convention; 
restored the government by making Peirpoint, Governor, regard- 
ing John Letcher as in abdication at Richmond; and from one 
step to another went on forming lines and a bill for a new State, 
which was finished by Congress, and signed by A. Lincoln as a 
New Year's present. Your humble servant was genei'ally there 
in those days, but long since forgotten. We assumed to be 
Virginia, and was so recognized by the Washington powers. 

By the way, at the time of hurrying out of Richmond, John 
Letcher, who was then Governor (but Letcher always was a 
Union man at Heart), sent a dispatch to arrest us runaway 
members of the Convention; but took good care to see that the 
despatch was a few minutes too late. After the war was over, 
I met Letcher at his home at Lexington, and talked hours with 
him. He said he was always with us in heart, but had to 
appear nominally with the South. The roughs of Richmond 
ran up a rebel flag on the capitol and Letcher made them haul 
it down, as we had not up to that time seceded. So John was 
not so bad. 

Those who stayed behind were: E. B. Hall, loyal to the 
backbone; Willey, weak. There was a Hall from Wetzel, who 
sold out for a gold-headed cane. He was a sure "gold-bug" — 
voted for secession. 

John Goode stopped off at Washington with Alf. Bai'bour, 
so Barbour could resign the office of Superintendent of the 
Armory at Harper's Ferry. At Harper's Ferry, Barbour 
stepped off the train and said something and up went a tumul- 
tuous shout. I stepped off and said: "Barbour, what did you 
say?" He did not reply, and to avoid arrest I stepped back on 
the train and guessed he was there to grab the arsenal and steal 
all its valuable and costly machinery. It turned out that way. 
Revolutionary devilment took the locks off our mouths. 

Va.-35 



546 THE BENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

When I got home, the Rockbridge Cavalry of the South 
dashed around my house at Pruntytown; had a writ from Colo- 
nel Porterfield to take me, "dead or alive." I was not there. 
My wife and boy of sixteen boldly defied them, and wife said, 
"Thank God, he is not in the house." And the little boy 
wrenched his gun out of their hands, and the officer told him 
he was "a brave boy," and might keep his gun. The Richmond 
Enquirer came out and said: "The execrable and damnable 
Burdett we missed by a hair's breadth; but had we got him, 
would have spent no time in guarding him!" All that class of 
men — Jew, gentile, dog and devil — have all passed to their 
wicked level; and, thank God, I am still in the land of the 
living. 

The incident of Carlile's gold chain I forget. But his con- 
duct as to loyalty was golden up to the critical hour of secession, 
and he was assaulted and insulted for his bold opposition to it. 

Willey, who stayed behind and figured with the vile end 
of the Convention, was always wishy-washy — short on back- 
bone; and God only knows what soft talk was done; but 
some said he was weak enough to hint a purpose to organize 
when he got back to Western Virginia the squirrel-gun boys of 
the mountains to aid the rebels. But when he got back he 
seemed almost dazed at the general enthusiasm and loyalty 
of West Virginians; and at Wheeling, on the balcony of the 
McLure, being called for, opened up by declaring a lock was on 
his mouth, alluding to the injunction of secrecy put on us on 
the passage of the ordinance. It fell still-born. Some fellow 
bawled out: "Hang him!" In obedience to a loud and universal 
call, your humble correspondent was called to follow him; and 
my first remark was that I had no lock on my mouth, or lips 
hermetically sealed as to keeping secrets of rebels. Thunders 
of applause followed, as did with almost each sentence in our 
continued remarks. I simply shot from the shoulder and boldly 
uttered defiance to the damnable and wicked act of secession. 

Mr. Willey attempted the same speech at Morgantown, and 
was hooted at and was called on clamorously to "Talk Union!" 
Well (would you believe it?), to stiffen his backbone, Kramer 
and a few white-washing friends rushed up to Wheeling — the 
Legislature being in session — and in the confusion of the hour, 
actually put him into the United States Senate— because, with 



TKAGIC DEATH OF HUGHES. 547 

all his faults, lie was an orator and talented, and would adoru 
the station! So pluck and nerve counted for nothing. Such is 
human frailty. He is dead — peace to his ashes! 

John N. Hughes was elected as an ultra Union man, with 
circular and speeches declaring he would suffer arms torn off and 
body immolated on the altar of his country before he would 
vote for an ordinance of secession, taking his State, Virginia, 
out of the Union. It is a ghastly story to tell. Burley, of 
Moundsville, Hughes and myself, all loyal men, roomed together, 
and all vied -,,ith each other as to our loyalty and devotion to 
the United States. But in a short time, Hughes, for some rea- 
sons I will explain, came in one day and in an exulting manner 
said he was going to vote for an ordinance separating Virginia 
from the Union. I replied: "If you do, in the face of solemn 
pledges to your Randolph constituents, you will never prosper 
in this world or the world to come." He threatened me with 
violence. I defied him and told him that a man guilty of such 
treachery and infidelity could not whip any one. Well, he 
voted for the ordinance, and skedaddled from Richmond; and 
at McClellan's fight at Rich Mountain, in Randolph County, 
he was in the act of rushing on horseback, as he thought, to 
the United States lines, and halloed, "Hurrah for Lincoln!" It 
turned out to be the rebel lines, and they shot seventeen bul- 
lets into his body. Thus do the judgments of an avenging God 
overcome us! 

James Burley, if alive, could attest what I say, and we 
deplored his terrible crime at the time. And now for the 
reasons. He was, soon after getting to Richmond, found embar- 
rassed with the faro banks; and for the few paltry dollars that 
he fell behind with the gamblers was so weak as to be "yanked" 
by them. I offered, after finding it out, to pay the pitiful claims, 
and it met his anger and scorn. 

Well, six or seven others unfaithful met early deaths, while 
not a hair of the heads of the God-and-country glorious fifty-six 
loyal delegates that voted against the wicked act of secession 
ever was touched; and I am here to-day, a living monument of 
the providential incidents of the madness of the days of 1861. 



, CHAPTEE XXIII. 

SOME OF THE MEN WHO FIGURE IN THIS HISTORY. 



GEORGE W. SUMMERS OF KANAWHA. 

DIMINUENDO. 

'No delegate from Western Virginia went into the 
Richmond Convention with a larger fame than George W. 
Summers of Kanawha; none came out of it with reputa- 
tion more diminished. He was a man of proved ability, 
who in earlier years among Virginia public men had 
towered like Saul among the prophets. He had held a 
high place in Virginia public life, on the Whig side of 
politics. He was a consummate orator and was regarded 
on all sides as a very able man. In the Virginia Con- 
vention of 1850-51 he was considered the champion of 
Western rights and interests, in behalf of which he made a 
speech that was deemed the greatest effort of his career. 
In this he clearly showed that all the wrong and discrimi- 
nation suffered by the West was the outgrowth of the ma- 
lignant system of slavery which ruled the State. Under 
the constitution submitted by that Convention, Mr. Sum- 
mers was a candidate for Governor. He was defeated — 

548 



GEORGE W. SUMMERS. 549 

only because of his anti-slaverj attitude — by "Jo." Jolm- 
son of Harrison, a pro-slavery Democrat, who, without 
education, without any of the graces of oratory and with a 
lack of personal pulchritude amounting almost to ugli- 
ness, was an acute and successful politician. 

Summers was sent to the Richmond Convention of 
1861 on pledges of faithfulness to the Union — pledged 
iio less by his whole public life as an opponent of the pro- 
slavery party in Virginia. He avoided in the Convention 
a technical betrayal of his pledges by voting against the 
ordinance of secession ; but from facts already stated and 
others yet to be mentioned, he was clearly far more cul- 
pable than many who voted for the ordinance. The mis- 
chief done by him was on a larger scale — profound and 
far-reaching. After his return home (with full purpose 
to go back and take part with the revolution) he expressed 
in a printed address to his constituents his acquiescence in 
secession and his wish to assist in the work of adapting 
the constitution of Virginia to its new relation to the Con- 
federate States. Apparently at this point his heart failed 
him and he had not the courage to go back to Richmond 
and take the part his feelings prompted. 

UNSUPPORTED PROFESSIONS. 

He emerged from his retirement in 1863 long enough 
to make a speech at Wheeling trying to excuse his course 
in dissuading the Union commanders from occupying the 
Kanawha Valley prior to Wise's descent into it in the 
Spring of 1861. In this speech, he professed devotion to 
the principles held by the supporters of the United States 



550 THE RENDING OF VIEGINIA. 

and claimed lie had never departed from them — a declara- 
tion contradicted tlatlj by his own printed address to his 
constituents, and equally by the Lincoln-Baldwin episode 
detailed elsewhere, then known only to half a dozen peo- 
ple in Richmond and Washington but since disclosed to 
the world. Summers died in 1868, with a cloud on his 
fame which is not likely ever to be lifted. 

FATAL CONCESSIONS AT RICHMOND. 

In Mr. Summers' two-days speech in the Richmond 
Convention, while making unaswerable arguments against 
both the legality and expediency of secession, he neutral- 
ized them all by fatal concessions. ''We are all against 
coercion," he said. "We are all pledging ourselves against 
the policy of coercion, and rightly." "I recognize the 
secession of the Cotton-States," he said again, "as an ex- 
isting fact." It was "a narrow and unphilosophical states- 
manship that would regard the movement of those States, 
as organized commonwealths and by conventional decrees 
and ordinances, in the light of partial insurrectionary 
movements in opposition to State authority. Who would 
compare them with such movements as Shay's Rebellion 
or the Whiskey Insurrection ?" Answering the inquiry, 
what were best to be done, he said he would "let those 
States alone." He "would use no force. Force now is 
Civil War, and with Civil War the bonds of our Union 
can never be reunited." When a man like Summers could 
thus surrender the key to the Union position, what hope 
could there be for men less able deluded by the same 
fallacy ? It was only necessary for the conspirators to 



GEORGE W. SUMMERS. 551 

briiio; events to the convergence where the government 
would be driven to use force or disband, to put Mr. Sum- 
mers and all of like faith at their mercj. That was the 
strategy, and it won ; and we have seen how carefully Mr. 
Summers helped prepare the way. 

The fatal weakness of Mr. Summers' attitude in the 
Richmond Convention, and of others like-minded, was per- 
ceived by Horace Greeley who printed in the Tribune 
April 6, 1861, an open letter to the Virginia statesman, 
from which are these extracts : 

We shall readily agree that slavery is at the bottom of 
our National troubles; and when I add that I accept your 
speech in the Constitutional Convention of your State, nearly 
thirty years [?] ago, as in the main a forcible and full expres- 
sion of my own views on that theme, I shall have disposed of 
all preliminaries. That speech proves that you are just as well 
aware as I am that it is slavery, and nothing but slavery, that 
has dragged Virginia down from the proud position she once 
held. * * * You know that slavery alone, as you have so 
forcibly depicted it, has been the overshadowing curse of Vir- 
ginia, depriving her people of decent roads, of common schools, 
of manufacturing and mineral development, and of every other 
element of rapid and beneficent progress. And you have no more 
doubt than I have (I claim to know only by your public record) 
that if slavery were expelled from your State to-morrow, the 
value of her soil would thereby be trebled, the aggregate of her 
wealth increased, and her population doubled in the next twenty 
years. When, therefore, you try to say what will be satisfactory 
to the natural and earnest advocates of free trade, eternal 
slavery, and all that have made Virginia what she is, you 
wrong yourself without deceiving them. They know that you 
are acting a part, and you feel that they cannot deem it a cred- 
itable one. * * * 

The Union is quite as important to the South as to the 
North, and you know it. When, therefore, you talk, as in the 
never-ending conclusions of your Convention, of the "grievances" 



552 THE REXDIXG OF YIKGINIA. 

of the South and of the "guaranties" j'ou will require of the 
North, you talk as becomes Secessionists only, and in such 
manner as to play directly into their hands. And when you 
talk of the withdrawal of the Gulf States from the Union, as if 
that v/ere the exercise of a conceded constitutional right, you 
do your best to show that the professions under which you 
carried Virginia for Bell were hollow, and yourselves, in con- 
sistency with your present views, ought to have voted for 
Breckenridge and Lane. 



HIS TREACHERY TO THE UNIONISTS IX THE CONVENTION. 

In the chapter on the Richmond Convention, the facts 
touching" Mr. Summers' betrayal of President Lincohi's 
confidence at the critical time in the Convention when the 
history of that body, and of the country, might have been 
turned into different channels if he had been faithful to 
his professions and his friends, are brought out in detail 
from official sources. Mr. Lincoln's sagacity had per- 
ceived, what others did not seem to comprehend, the dan- 
gerous folly of holding the Convention in session at Rich- 
mond exposed to the campaign of conspiracy — of intimi- 
dation, bribery, false promises, flattery and other seduc- 
tions — when nothing could possibly be gained to the Union 
cause or to the peace of the country from its presence. 
"Why don't you adjourn the Convention ?" were Mr. Lin- 
coln's first words to Mr. Summers' emissary, whom he 
supposed to be in full sympathy with his own purpose. 
Adjourn the Convention ! Mr. Baldwin was astounded. 
That was the last thing to be though'" of by himself and 
other secret rebels masquerading in the garments of Union- 
ists. He would never consent to aajourn till the issue 
raised by the Secessionists had been settled — as if that 



GEORGE W. SUMMERS. 553 

Convention could possibly settle it by staying tbere ex- 
cept in the way it did. Mr. Lincoln's proposition was a 
center shot. Lewis says it would have been accepted by 
the Union majority of the Convention if it had been made 
to them. If it had been, it would have disconcerted the 
conspirators, have broken up all their plans and have 
forced them into open revolution with far less strength 
than they derived from the act of secession. 

When Baldwin came back with his report of Mr. Lin- 
coln's offer to evacuate Sumter if the Convention would 
adjourn, Summers instead of communicating it to the 
LTnion men of the Convention continued silent and secret 
as the grave. When Botts, after being told by President 
Lincoln, repeated the story of Bakhvin's refusal to sturdy 
John F. Lewis, he told his room-mate Algernon S. Gray, 
who jumped out of bed in his surprise and declared he had 
supposed these facts were known to only three men in 
Hichmond — who must have been himself, Baldwin and 
Summers. Baldwin, like Summers, voted against the or- 
dinance ; but he changed his vote and signed it, received a 
colonel's commission in the Confederate army and held a 
seat in the Confederate Congress throughout the rebellion. 
What honors and emoluments would have been conferred 
on Mr. Summers if he had gone back to Richmond, as he 
expected and desired, who can guess ? This Lincoln-Bald- 
win episode, proven by the sworn testimony of Mr. Bald- 
win and others, is an "X-ray" on the Kanawha statesman. 
It illuminates his whole connection with the Convention, 
interprets the things he said and did at Richmond and 
after his return home, and shows the faithlessness of his 
pretended Unionism. 



554 THE REiS^DIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

HE RECOGNIZES THE USURPATION. 

He sent his resignation to Governor Letcher, still re- 
cognizing him, and therefore, the rest of the rebels and 
nsiirpers at Richmond, as the lawful authorities of the 
State. Then under date of May 27th, he published a let- 
ter to his constituents annoimcing his resignation and ex- 
plaining that "nothing but an imperative sense of per- 
sonal duty" had induced this action. The condition of 
his family, "with the slow means of communication and 
transit between this Valley and Richmond" precluded his 
"absence at such a distance." Entirely willing otherwise 
to continue to act officially with the rebels and usurpers ! 
He expresses regret that he had not resigned in time to 
permit the election of a successor May 23d but explains : 

AND ACCEPTS THE CONFEDERACY. 

"I still entertained hope that I might be able to return 
tc the adjourned session of the Convention Avliich com- 
mences on the 12th day of June next. For," he continues, 
"although the greater question has been decided and the 
subsequent labors of the Convention w^ill be of less mo- 
ment and importance comparatively. * * * I was 
especially desirous to have participated in the amendments 
and modifications of the State constitution which will be- 
come necessary for the Convention to prepare and submit 
to the people, several of which, in addition to those applica- 
ble to inherent defects in the constitution itself, have he- 
come essential in consequence of the change which has oc- 
curred in our political relations." Fully accepted the 



GEORGE "W. SUMMERS. 555 

Southern Confederacv and wanted to have a hand in it ! 
When Summers tokl the Wheeling peoj)le in August, 1863, 
that he had never been anything but a suj)porter of the 
government of the United States, he must have forgotten 
about this address. 

'^'^reinforcing" the unionists. 

He totally ignored the movement of the Unionists in 
the Northwest ; never went near nor communicated with 
them. He seems to have been busv making fair weather 
with the Secessionists around him. There were then, be- 
fore Wise went down into the Valley, some 1,500 to 
1,800 organized Confederate volunteers there; and the 
reports that reached Wheeling were to the effect that Sum- 
mers had gone over to all intents and purposes to these 
rebels and was in full fellowshii? and co-operation with 
them. "Yet at Richmond" said the Intelligencer at the 
time "he had advised the IvTorthwestern members to hurry 
home and inaugurate their movement, telling them he 
would be along in a little v/hile to reinforce them." This 
was reinforcing them with a vengeance ! His manifesto 
was regarded by the Unionists as an abandonment of all 
that he had professed in former times — and such it was. 
In the course of the document, from which we have already 
quoted, Mr. Summers said : 

REPELS UNION "INVASION." 

The idea suggested by some excitable persons that any por- 
tion of the people of this region desire Federal troops to be 
sent to our soil for our protection, apart from the imputation 



556 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

which it conveys [ ?] , is simply ridiculous. Our people have 
recorded their opinions at the polls as freemen. When called 
upon to act, they will act as becomes them. They neither need 
nor ask such protection; and any attempt to afford it would tie 
regarded in the light of an invasion, and would most likely 
unite all classes in its repulsion All we ask is to be let alone. 

One of the first declarations made by the loyal Con- 
vention at Wheeling in June, 1861, was that the march 
of United States troops into Virginia was not an "inva- 
sion" but was Avelcomed for the protection of the rights 
of her citizens. This reveals the gulf that yawned be- 
tween Summers and the Union associates he had aban- 
doned. A man of his intelligence did not need to be told 
that in war, within the theater of action — a theater which 
could not be limited except by the exigencies of the par- 
ties to it — nobody could expect to be let alone. It is true 
this was all Jefferson Davis asked; but even this trifle 
could not be permitted him. 

UNMOLESTED BY WISE. 

It is also true that Mr. Summers personally was let 
alone when the Confederate army came in — and the fact 
does not strengthen his claim that he was a supporter of 
the United States government. While W^ise ravaged and 
destroyed, confiscated and stole, the property of Union 
men wherever he found it, and made them prisoners when 
he could, Mr. Summers with a large estate was not dis- 
turbed and lost not a penny. Yet nobody impeaches 
Wise's hatred of Unionists. Summers told his Wheeling 
audience in 1863 that Wise had given out in passing 
through Lewisburg that Summers would be the first man 



GEORGE W. SUMMERS. 557 

he would liang when he got down into the Kanawha Val- 
ley. General Wise did not execute the threat. lie would 
have been very ungrateful to have done so, for nobody 
had done so much to give him a clear field in that valley. 
After the restored government had been seated in Rich- 
mond, Wise, who used to sometimes lounge in the office 
of Lewis, Governor Peirpoint's Secretary of the Com- 
monwealth, told him one dav that when he invaded West- 
ern Virginia in the Spring of 1861, if he had captured 
Peirpoint he would have hanged him. But as for hang- 
ing Judge Summers — that was a different proposition. 
His success in hanging John Brown and the glory it con- 
ferred on him, rather unsettled Wise on the subject of 
hanging. There were people forty years ago, and may be 
a few yet, who believed a little hanging would not have 
been wasted on Henry A. Wise himself. 

KEEPS OUT UXIOX TROOPS. 

The day Mr. Summers dated his address to his con- 
stituents about being let alone and not needing the pro- 
tection of United States troops, Confederate soldiers were 
in Fetterman, moving up to Grafton to join others just 
coming in from the South. Mr. Summers was never ac- 
cused of being a fool. He knew, even if not in the coun- 
sels of the rebels^ that the immediate invasion of West- 
ern Virginia was to be expected. Yet he went to work 
with great activity to dissuade the Federal commanders 
in Ohio from sending troops to occupy the Kanawha, go- 
ing himself to Gallipolis for that purpose and sending a 
delegation on to Cincinnati to see General McClellan, in 



558 THE RENDING OF VIEGINIA. 

command of the department. He argued this policy in his 
address, claiming that the Kanawha Valley might main- 
tain a position of neutrality and exemption from military 
operations. 

"Let the military forces on the other side of the Ohio," 
said this innocent, "so far as there are any, remain on 
their own soil and let their mission be to preserve the 
peace and quiet of the border, not to irritate or invite vio- 
lence." Mr. Summers' coadjutor, Baldwin, argued to Mr. 
Lincoln that the ])resence of the garrison in Fort Sumter 
was calculated to "irritate" the peaceful lambs in Charles- 
ton and provoke them to "violence." Therefore the Fort 
should be evacuated. But Mr. Summers seems to have 
made no effort to keep out troops which might try to get 
into his peaceful preserve from the South. 

SIGNIFICANCE OF HIS ATTITUDE. 

The Wheeling Intelligencer printed Mr. Summers' let- 
ter and made the following and other pointed comment 
on it: 

All Judge Summers wants is to be let alone — just like the 
Secessionists talk. All they wanted here in Wheeling a few 
weeks ago was to be let alone. "Don't get up your Union organ- 
izations," they said; "you will raise an excitement." And while 
they were talking this way, Governor Letcher was writing let- 
ters to Colonel Porterfield to come up here, take our arms, burn 
the railroad and its bridges, and commit any amount of depre- 
dations that might be necessary to make us helpless and defense- 
less. That is the way the let-alone policy works. It means 
secession and nothing else. And Judge Summers, when he uses 
it, is either wilfully or ignorantly playing into the hands of the 
Secessionists. What the people of the Kanawha Valley need in 
their midst is United States troops; and we rejoice in the hope 
and belief that they will see them there before Saturday night. 



GEOKGE W. SUMMERS. 559 

Bnt that was just what did not happen. Mr, Sum- 
mers had the ear of McCleUan to the exclusion of his 
Union neighbors who protested. Troops were withheld 
from the Kanawha until Wise had come in, possessed and 
ravaged. Then, near the end of the summer an army 
under General Cox was permitted to go over into Mr. Sum- 
mers' neutral domain and, with the help of Rosencranz, 
drive Wise out. Meanwhile, not only the valley of the 
Kanawha but that of the Guyandotte — indeed, all the 
Southwest — were overrun and suffered deplorable loss and 
outrage at the hands of Wise and his subordinates, Jen- 
kins, Witcher and Pate. Albert Gallatin Jenkins, who 
had been a congressman, immediately on the passage of 
the ordinance of secession began to raise a cavalry regi- 
ment in Cabell County. IsTow his and similar bands, is- 
suing from Wise's headquarters, overran the country "ar- 
resting" Parker says "and taking to Wise's camp incor- 
rigible Unionists ; and such as he failed to convert and 
subdue, Wise forwarded to Richmond." Mr. Parker him- 
self and Henry J, Samuels had to leave their homes to 
escape Wise's vengeance. Mr. Parker left his house at 
Guyandotte on the third of July "about an hour," he 
says, "before a squad of Jenkins' cavalry came to arrest 
me and take me to Wise's headquarters." 

SATAN LET LOOSE IN KANAWHA. 

A vivid picture of Wise's drastic treatment of the 
Unionists in the Kanawha Valley during his reign of ter- 
ror there in the Summer of 1861 is found in an account 
given to the editor of the Wheeling Intelligencer by some 
gentlemen from that region who visited Wheeling in 



560 THE BENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

Xovember of that year. The following is an editorial 
statement of their report in the issue of that paper for 
Xovember 29, 1861: 

Since early in the summer, the valley has been the scene of 
warfare. Wise came among the people as a besom of devasta- 
tion. He literally laid bare the country all around him. His 
worthless promises to pay are left widespread among the peo- 
ple; but their corn, their wheat, their oats, their hay, their 
bacon — their all — is gone, to be heard of no more. He took 
horses, mules, wagons, and impressed them in his service, both 
as he came and as he left. He paid for nothing the whole time. 
His cavalry sustained themselves by depredating first upon one 
farm and then upon another. They roved from field to field, 
from locality to locality, like droves of grasshoppers. They let 
down fences, entered and fed their horses from grain in the 
shock. They took corn and oats from the barns. They quar- 
tered themselves at the tables of the farmers like so many 
brigands and footpads, never even giving so much as a slip of 
Wise's script in return. Their trail was desolation everywhere. 
The infantry were provided for by the script system. Foragers 
were sent out whose duty it was to spy out the fat places, to 
stay and make valuation on farm products, to store houses of 
provisions, etc., and give the owners certificates therefor. If 
the owners objected, the property was considered sold in spite 
of the objection, and was transferred to the wagons just as 
though it had been paid for in gold. Nothing was allowed to 
interfere. In like manner clothing and everything else that was 
of value was taken. 

In the town of Charleston, the case of two young Jews, 
clothes dealers, afforded a distressing example of Wise's bru- 
talism. He got hold of a letter which one of them had written 
to a dealer in the East, a't the bottom of which was a note indi- 
cating his sympathy with the Union. Wise had him and his 
brother arrested and thrown into prison; and on being visited 
by a lawyer on their behalf, revealed a depth of devilish brutal- 
ity that astounded his visitor beyond belief. He said he intended 
to have these Jews shot unless they made over their stock of 
goods to him; that if they would assign the goods, he would 



GEOKGE W. SUMMEES. 561 

not shoot them; but that he wanted it understood that either 
through blood or an instrument of writing he intended to have 
the goods. The lawyer (from whose own lips we have thcoo 
facts) went back to the poor fellows and told them the sorry 
tale. He left them in prison in tears. The sequel was that 
Wise took the property and carried them away captive with him. 
The "old demon used to curse frightfully. His profanity 
was most disgusting. When he had no one else to curse, he 
cursed O. Jennings, his son, and cursed him roundly, too. Espe- 
cially did he belabor him when Jennings remonstrated against 
destroying the beautiful and costly bridge over Elk River. His 
whole bearing was that of a maniac devil — seemingly let loose 
to fill a portion of the unexpired term of Satan himself. Never 
did a people more rejoice to see a pestilence leave their midst 
tha'n the people of Kanawha to see Wise compelled to make off. 
The feeling was not confined to Union men; it was generaL 

In liis message to tlic Legislature in December, 1861, 
Governor Peirpoint called attention to the lamentable con- 
dition of the southern section of the State which had been 
overrun by the secession forces: 

There seems to be no doubt that nearly all the able-bodied 
men between sixteen and sixty have been forced into the Con- 
federate army, including thousands who are at heart true to 
the Constitution and the Union. Public improvements — rail- 
roads, canals, bridges and public buildings — have been destroyed 
wherever the secession forces have had control. Rapine and 
plunder have marked their path; and men arrogating to them- 
selves a superior civilization, derived, as they say, from the 
existence of negro slavery among them, have abandoned the 
rules of civilized warfare and made war like savages, a scene 
of indiscriminate and useless destruction. A large proportion 
of the slaves have been sent farther South for security. All 
the live stock within the rebel lines has been seized for the use 
of the army. Farms have been stripped of horses, wagons, 
fencing and timber, and the houses of the people of blankets and 
even clothing — whatever, in short, could be made useful to the 
soldiers. The property of men known or supposed to be true 
to the Union has been taken without compensation, and they 

Va.-36 



562 THE REXDIXG OF VIKGINIA. 

regard themselves fortunate whose lives are spared. The prop- 
erty which is pretended to be paid for is paid for in treasury 
notes of the Confederate States, or in bank notes issued on the 
deposit of such treasury notes. This currency, even at Rich- 
mond, is already at a discount of not less than thirty per cent 
— really valueless. In those counties where loyalty to the Union 
has prevailed, I am happy to announce, the people to a great 
extent have been spared the ravages of Civil War, and the 
powers of the State government are now in the hands of true 
men. 

The man very largely responsible for these calamities 
remained, most of his time, on his farm some twent*^ miles 
from Charleston, in peace and security — unmolested, as 
Woods of Barbour would say, losing neither sleep nor" 
property but losing what men everywhere deem inestima- 
ble, the respect and confidence of those who had put faith 
in his professions as a man and citizen. 

THE MISTAKE OF HIS LIFE. 

It is a curious and instructive commentary, no less on 
the instability of men than on the vicissitudes of politics, 
that a man of Mr. Summers' caliber — whose life-long 
and commendable aspirations for public distinction had 
been antagonized and defeated by the pro-Slavery party 
of Virginia, which now, by easy transition, had become 
the party of secession, should have finally surrendered to 
it in the ripe maturity of his powers, under pressure of 
a crisis which was about to overthrow forever the malign 
power which his intellect and moral convictions had forced 
him to resist all his life. If he had only remained true to 
these — to himself — through that crisis, he would have 
emerged with a distinction and honor which would have 
crowned the best labors and purposes of his career. 



WAITMAN T. WILLEY. 563 



WAITMAN T. WILLEY OF MONONGALIA. 

Both in the Richmond Convention and for a short time 
after his return home, Waitman T. Willey held an atti- 
tude not unlike Mr. Summers, But the case at home was 
a little different with them. Summers' constituency in- 
cluded a large and influential secession element ; Willey's 
practically none. Summers was a rich man and could 
afford to sulk in his tent if he chose. JSTot so with Willey. 
Both labored under the disability, as it was given out, of 
having a relative in ill health consideration and care for 
whom afforded a reasonable pretext for retirement. But 
while Mr. Summers was independent, the exigencies of 
Mr. Willey's circumstances brought him around into co- 
operation wdth the reorganization movement in time to 
profit by the election of senators under the restored gov- 
ernment ; and only ten days after the rebel Convention at 
Richmond had discussed whether he w^as or was not "dis- 
loyal" to them, and had given him the benefit of the doubt 
by refusing to expel him along with the rest of the 
"traitors," he was elected by the Legislature at Wheeling 
to the United States Senate. Mr. Summers held on in his 
recalcitrant course, but two years later, when he found 
he had made a mistake, went to Wheeling and made a 
speech in attempted exculpation of himself. 

In the old ante-bellum times. Summers and Willey 
were the "wheel-horses" of the W^hig party in Western 
Virginia. Both wTre famous stump speakers. In the 
Richmond Convention both took high rank for ability and 



564 THE KENDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

oratory ; and both made fervid speeches on the side of the 
Union — yet guarded and negative, standing in that zone 
of Border-State conservatism whicli recognized in a vague 
way the undefined grievance of the State against the gen- 
eral government, and conceding, as the accepted method 
of putting themselves in touch with those to whom their 
arguments were addressed, certain essentials fatal to the 
outcome of their whole argument. In one of these speeches 
of Mr. Willey from which quotation is elsewhere made, it 
was more than implied that if the hypothetical wrongs of 
Virginia, which nobody ever attempted to precisely define, 
should not be righted by legal and constitutional redress, 
he was prepared to stand shoulder to shoulder with the 
revolutionary Wise and bring ten thousand strong arms 
from the ISTorthwest in the ultima ratio as against the op- 
pressor. That is what the phillipic meant if it meant 
anything. If as Fontaine Smith claimed, this was only 
Mr. Willey's way of winning his rebellious auditory, the 
method was not without its perils. It was playing with 
fire ; for Mr. "Wise might reasonably have been led to ex- 
pect that when his army of invasion got across the moun- 
tains these ten thousand strong arms, with Mr. Willey at 
their head, would hasten to join his standard. The whole 
theory of such argument was wrong. There was no hoi^e 
of winning back the secession conspirators. Argaimenfc 
was wasted on them. It was the weak-kneed Unionists 
who needed bracing up. What they needed was not baby- 
food, but nourishing diet and tonics such as were admin- 
istered by Carlile. 

Mr. Willey, himself a slaveholder, was intensely pro- 
slavery in his sympathies. He had been on intimate terms, 



WAITMAX T. WILLEY. 565 

politically and personally, with Whig politicians ; had 
heen a candidate for Lieutenant Governor on their ticket 
M'ith Goggin two years before. He sought to stand well 
with them. He had political aspirations which his talents 
justified ; and no politician with his leanings could see any 
future in Virginia at that time if he did not fall in with 
the pro-slavery ideas that ruled the Commonwealth. In 
I he Richmond Convention, his great embarrassment was 
that he represented the hottest Union county in the Xortli- 
west, right up against the Pennsylvania border. It was 
hard to please the old Virginia regime without offending 
the constituency at home. It was a situation to keep a 
man on the ragged edge and undermine his constitution. 
Mr. Willey voted against his ISTorthwestern colleagues 
on Carlile's decisive motion to strike from the report of 
the Federal Relations Committee the declaration that the 
United States must not enforce the laws in the seceded 
States. In the presidential campaign the year before, he 
v;as a supporter — I believe an elector — of the Bell and 
Everett ticket, which stood on a platform for "the enforce- 
ment of the laws." He was especially bitter against the 
Republican party and against Mr. Lincoln as its success- 
ful rej)resentative ; and gave expression to this feeling as 
late as the Fall of 1861, in an election circular when a 
candidate for a seat in the Constitutional Convention, 
when merely party feeling among Union men had been 
nearly everywhere forgotten. Yet can any one, in the 
clearer light of the intervening forty years, point out 
to-day any other party in the United States which in the 
election of 1860 could possibly have organized enough re- 
sistance to the growing insurrection to have saved this 



566 THE RENDING OF VIKGIXIA. 

Nation from going to pieces, or to have saved it on any 
moral basis except hostility to slavery ? 

When Mr. Willey came home from Richmond, it soon 
appeared that his position was equivocal ; that he was not 
m harmony with the movement in the Northwest to resist 
the usurpation ; and it was freely reported that on the way 
back through Virginia he had made a speech very severely 
arraigning the President for issuing the call for troops — 
as if there was any other thing left for the President to do, 
unless he was to basely abandon his post of duty and sur- 
render the government to its assailants. This speech is re- 
ferred to by Mr. Parker in his "Formation" as an exhorta- 
tion to the people of Virginia "to repel any invasion of 
Virginia's soil by the Yankees." 

But Mr. Willey was a man of fine talents and engag- 
ing qualities, whom neighbors and friends wanted to save 
to the Union cause, and to his friends and family, if they 
could. Peirpoint's anxiety to have him attend the May 
Convention, and the zeal of Leroy Kramer and others to 
make him senator, was in part an expression of this wush. 
But in the May Convention he was clearly out of sym- 
pathy with the popular feeling as there manifested, and 
asked to be excused from service on its committee which 
was to formulate the business of the Convention on plea of 
necessary absence, though he remained to the end. And 
notwithstanding the fact that the State was already in 
the military possession of the Southern Confederacy, he 
professed to believe that the first duty before them was 
to try to defeat the ratification of the ordinance of seces- 
sion. He did not appear again in public co-operation with 
the movements at Wheeling in the Summer of 1861; but 



WAITMAX T. WILLEY. 567 

when the State government had been successfully reorgan- 
ized and recognized at Washington ; when the Federal 
troops had driven out the rebel invaders and held the 
mountain inlets into the ISTorthwest, and when, under these 
conditions of assured safety and success, the Legislature of 
the restored government came together and proceeded to 
fill the senatorships made vacant by the treason of Hunter 
and Mason, he became a candidate, and, to the very gen- 
eral surprise, was elected over Lamb and Van Winkle, 
who had all summer been doing heroic service in the w^ork 
of reorganization. In the House of Delegates, he was 
nominated by Fontaine Smith, who apologized at length 
for his candidate's short-comings. Mr. Smith said : 

I am aware that it has been said that Mr. Willey's course 
heretofore has been too conservative, and his speeches in the 
Convention at Richmond have been pointed out as evidence of 
that conservatism; and also certain flings at the Administra- 
tion; certain ifs and ands and certain recommendations in re- 
lation to compromise. Let me say, what I believe it almost 
unnecessary to say and what every gentleman must know, that 
a speech adapted to a Wheeling audience or this body would be 
ill adapted to a Conventoin at Richmond. He had, sir, whea 
there to temporize his arguments; he had to address his auditory 
according to their prejudices; and hence he may not have come 
out so fully as we would have desired at that time. He adopted 
the language of the illustrious Apostle: "Babes will not en- 
dure meat." They must be fed on weak diet. The arguments 
we advance here would not suit the people at Richmond. * * * 
He engaged in that species of argumentation for the purpose 
of winning and captivating and carrying along with him that 
people. He erred in judgment, I know, sir, but not in motive. 
For they did not desire reason or judgment, or anything but 
rebellion; they were going into that headlong in spite of logic 
and everything else. 



568 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

I know, too, it has been charged upon Mr. Willey that he 
did not stand up to Mr. Lincoln when he issued his proclamation 
after the fall of Sumter. But who among us did not at that 
moment waver? Not in relation to the constitutionality of such 
a course; but I put the question to gentlemen whether they did 
not at that moment doubt the propriety of it? Did they not 
believe if that proclamation had not been precipitated upon us 
we could have fixed up some sort of a compromise which would 
have been honorable to us and would have restored harmony in 
the South. 

If ever man was "damned with faint praise," Mr. Wil- 
ley was in this speech of Smith's. 

Mr. Parker thinks the secret of Mr. Willey's sudden 
and successful emergence was the aid of the Methodist 
Episcopal Church, in which he was a zealous and eminent 
communicant. This church was at that time a political 
power in the Northwest. In the chapter contributed by 
Mr. Burdett, will be found his theory of the matter ; and 
perhaps if we accept a combination of the two, we shall 
not go far astray. Mr. Carlile's election was the sponta- 
neous tribute of all classes and creeds in recognition of 
his heroic attitude in the Richmond Convention and his 
subsequent services at home ; Mr. Willey's was the result 
of an adroit still-hunt of some kind, for he had not yet 
done anything to entitle him to the popular gratitude, or 
even confidence, and it was not even known he was a can- 
didate till nominated in the two houses of the Legislature. 

In the Richmond (rebel) Convention, June 29, 1861~ 
after the recess, report of the Committee on Elections was 
taken up, recommending "expulsion of disloyal members," 
and the recommendation of the committee agreed to. Hon. 
William G. Brown of Preston was the first to walk the 



•waitmajst t. willey. 569 

plank. Then "the other names on the list were taken up 
seriatim and the traitors expelled," they being: Burley, 
Burdett, Carlile, E, B. Hall, Hubbard, Jackson, McGrew, 
Porter, Stuart of Doddridge and Tarr. "In the case of 
Willey of Monongalia/' the report in the Richmond paper 
continues, "an animated debate and interchange of views 
took place. Statements affecting the loyalty of Mr. Wil- 
ley and remarks uj)on the weight of evidence presented 
pro and con were submitted by several members. The re- 
port was then, on motion of Mr. Haymond, recommitted 
to the Committee on Elections." N^o doubt Mr. Hay- 
mond's personal friendship had something to do with this 
tenderness towards Mr. Willey; yet the facts inevitably 
suggest the equivocal attitude Mr. Willey held in that 
Convention. There was no hesitation about expelling Car- 
lile, Burdett and the rest of the "traitors." After Mr. 
Willey had been in the Senate several months, he was ex- 
pelled from the Richmond Convention, not on a report 
from the committee but on the motion of an individual 
member. The Convention could hardly do less. 

In the Senate, after the defection of Mr. Carlile, under 
pressure of the public demand from West Virginia, Mr. 
Willey yielding to the obvious necessity of the case, fell 
in with the current then setting strongly in favor of the 
erection of the ISTew State, and did good service in the later 
discussion in the Senate, and there is no doubt of his zeal 
and sincerity in that behalf from that time on. He had 
cast his fortunes with the measure and there was no rea- 
son why he should not desire its success. No cause ever 
lacked friends after its success was assured. It was hardly 
fair, though, for the friends of Mr. Willey to claim for 



570 TJIE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

liim all the credit of the "Willej Amendment ;" which was 
not his measure in any sense save the technical one that 
it was offered by him; for in offering the first substitute 
in which emancipation was embodied, he distinctly disa- 
vowed that feature of it on the floor of the Senate, de- 
claring it an advance beyond what was "personally agree- 
able" to him, in deference to the manifest determination 
of the Senate to pass no bill without such a provision. 

In 1876 was published a letter addressed to Mr. Wil- 
ley by Hon. Jacob Beeson Blair of Parkersburg, certifying 
to the Senator's zeal in behalf of the New State bill when 
before Congress and when it was in the hands of the Presi- 
dent. It is far from clear that Mr. Blair was quite in 
position to furnish such testimonials. At the critical time 
when Mr. Carlile's Trojan-horse had been introduced in 
the Senate, Mr. Parker reports the three Western Virginia 
members in the House were quite indifferent. They ap- 
parently believed a corresponding indifference existed 
among their constituents. Mr. Whaley declared the bill 
for admission could not get a vote in the House. His at- 
titude is confirmed by a statement made by Mr. Willey in 
the Constitutional Convention that he believed Mr. Whaley 
was "opposed to the whole project of the New State." 
But when West Virginia began to be heard from, these 
gentlemen began to warm up. Mr. Blair's later heat, like 
the Senator's to which ^he testifies, seems to have been de- 
veloped under pressure from home. The production of 
heat by pressure, whether in politics or physics, accords 
with scientific principles. 

Of the Northwestern delegates who withdrew from the 
Richmond Convention, Mr. Willey was the only one who 



WAIT MAN T. WILLEY. 571 

felt it necessary to fortify his reputation witli the testi- 
monials of friends. The others were content to accept 
the judgment of their contemporaries and of posterity 
upon the open and notorious facts. Perhaps Mr. Willey's 
place in history would not have suffered, in dignity at 
least, if he had been content to do the same. 



572 THE EEXDING OF YIEGIA'IA. 



GEN. JOHN J. JACKSON OF WOOD. 

Gen. John J. Jackson of Wood was conspicuous in the 
Richmond Convention as a champion of Western rights, 
but his ardor cooled when he got back home. He had 
talked boldly at Richmond in the earlv part of the session 
when the Union tide seemed to be coming in about what 
he would do and what the West would do in the event of 
secession ; but his first appearance after he came home in- 
dicated, if not a change of heart, at least a change of mani- 
festation. He went to the May Convention without the 
holding of any county convention, or the formal appoint- 
m.ent of delegates in any other manner, as recommended in 
the Clarksburg meeting, accompanied by a numerous 
clacque, and insisted on organizing that body as a mass- 
meeting, so that his clacque might have its hundred voices 
against Carlile's five regularly chosen. Three men ap- 
peared to be jealous of Carlile, whose courageous defiance 
of the conspirators at Richmond had, in the popular esti- 
mation, placed him at the head of public matters in West 
Virginia. These were Jackson, Willey and Peirpoint. 
General Jackson's course at the opening of the May Con- 
vention created a good deal of feeling ; and if he had per- 
sisted might have disrupted it and defeated the high hopes 
and great results which depended on it. When Carlile 
was pressing his immediate division plan, Jackson threat- 
ened to take his hat and leave the hall — like the spoiled 
child which threatens to take its playthings and go home. 
Again when Polsley asked to have the final report of the 
Committee on State and Federal Relations, which came in 



JACKSON OF WOOD. 573 

late at night and embodied the work of three days' sit- 
tings, laid over until morning so there might be a little 
time to examine and consider it^ General Jackson ob- 
jected; he wanted to go home; it was "corn-planting 
time." 

The Jacksons were a wealthy, and therefore influential, 
family. The old "General" as he was called, had grown to 
be rather arrogant and dogmatic. It required a good deal 
of deference to keep him in working line. If he could not 
have his unquestioned way, he was apt to make a row. 
There were plenty of loyalists in that Convention who 
did not have to be either persuaded or bribed to be such. 
They were Unionists from principle, not for precedence, 
nor "for revenue." A suspicion attaches to the Jacksons 
at this period that they did not rise to quite this serene 
level of patriotism ; that so influential a name had to be 
suitably recognized before it could be brought into cordial 
support of the government. Indeed, some of the offshoots 
were clear on the other side of the fence. In adminis- 
trative circles it was a time of doubt, uncertainty, anxiety. 
There was a great deal of grojiing in the dark. Many 
Border-State Union men expected to be taken care of; 
others had to be consulted, deferred to, placated. It was 
especially important to hold Western Virginia in line and 
conciliate doubtful elements. Under advice of party 
friends, in whom he had to trust, Mr. Lincoln in this 
crisis made some appointments which he and his friends 
found abundant cause to regret when it was too late to 
recall them. The self-seekers came in for a largely dis- 
proportionate share of the appointments ; and in West 
Virginia at least one of them has proved to the Eepub- 
lican Sinbad a veritable "old man of the sea." 



574 THE REXDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

About the last of June, 1861, a correspondent of the 
Cincinnati Commercial^ writing from Grafton, said : 

When at Pai'kersburg. I was curious to see General Jackson, 
the most conspicuous and one of the most influential citizens 
of that region. He is an object of general curiosity and sus- 
picion. The common people have no faith in him; but he pro- 
fesses Union sentiments and was extremely attentive to Generals 
McClellan and Rosencranz and their staffs, and to all the prin- 
cipal field officers who were in Parkersburg. He is a keen, 
sharp-featured, determined looking man, positive in deportment 
and impatient of constraint. He may be earnest in his pro- 
fessions of his fidelity, but he neither acts nor speaks like a 
man sincerely devoted to the Union. He expressed a fond wish 
that this expedition might be victorious, but our impression was 
that he was merely indulging in cheap lip service. At this time 
he is anxious about the fate of James M. Jackson, one of his 
sons, who a few days ago was arrested at Clarksburg on sus- 
picion of treason, together with ten or a dozen influential citi- 
zens of that place. 

The Cleveland Leader about this time, referring to 
the outlook in Western Virginia and the June Convention, 
about to meet, remarked : 

The report says that General Jackson will probably be the 
provisional governor. Whatever his executive abilities may be, 
we cannot think from what we saw of him at the former Con- 
vention that he is the man for the position. And if it be true, 
as reported a few days ago, that when the Ohio troops entered 
Parkersburg he complained of their "trampling down his grass," 
the people will agree with us. If he has not loyalty enough to 
spare an acre of grass for the sake of the salvation of his State, 
he will hardly do for Governor. 

This was doubtless written bv Mr. Page, who had 
been the representative of the Leader at the May Con- 
vention. 



CARLILE THE LEADER. 575 

CARLILE THE LEADER. 

In a limited sense, Carlile was the Mirabean of the 
Western Virginia revolution — in that he was the most 
intrepid^ forceful, commanding figure early in the strug- 
gle ; and in that the people were swayed by his eloquence 
somewhat as Thomas Carlyle says they were by ]\rirabeau 
in Provence: "'The wild multitudes moved under him as 
under the moon do the billow of the sea." Carlile showed 
himself mightily in earnest from the time he entered the 
Richmond Convention till he went to the Senate five 
months later. Despite his apostacy in the Senate, let us 
not believe but he was sincere at the time in his noble atti- 
tude in the Convention. There he did not mince matters, 
nor adapt his speeches, as Willey and Summers did, to the 
delicate political digestion of the hypothetical Unionists 
in that body. He told them the wholesome truth in plain 
and sometimes eloquent English. His manner of speech 
v.-as distasteful to the conspirators in the Convention, as 
it was to the mob in the galleries and elsewhere. He was 
one of the limited number of loyalists in that body who 
realized that the purpose of the conspirators was a deadly 
one and involved the gravest consequences ; one of the few 
who dared openly on the floor declare the right of the 
^National government to enforce its authority in Virginia 
and elsewhere in the South. Xot all his subsequent fault, 
grievous as it was, can cancel the debt we owe Carlile for 
his defense of the Union on the floor of that epochal body, 
from whom was to issue the edict that should open vials 
of wrath more devastating than those seen by the Rev- 
elator; where, with treachery and cowardice all around 



576 THE RENDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

Liiii within, and angrj mobs ready to burn him in effigy 
or hang him in the original in the streets, he dared to utter 
these glowing words : 

And now, Mr. President, in the name of our illustrious 
dead; ir the name of all the living; in the name of millions yet 
unborn — I protest against this wicked effort to destroy the fair- 
est and freest government on the earth. And I denounce all 
attempts to involve Virginia — to commit her to self-murder — 
as an insult to all reasonable living humanity and a crime 
against God! With the dissolution of this Union, I hesitate 
not to say, the sun of our liberty will be set forever. 

When the Western delegates returned home, Carlile 
easily rose to the leadership of the loyal movement in the 
Northwest. His readincs" his earnestness, his force, his 
commanding oratory, won admiration and assent wherever 
he spoke. In the May Conveni'on m the advocacy of a 
plan crude and impracticable for immediate separation 
from Virginia, so captivating was his speech and presence 
that he carried the popular api'lause till Peirpoint gave 
way to pique and complained that all others were pushed 
aside. 

It is true, and it plainly so appea:>, in the story of 
these pages, that Mr. Carlile lackec! the constructive 
strength necessary for the highest and enduring success. 
, He could not project himself into the untried and un- 
known and find with constructive foresight the safe and 
only way to bridge the abyss, like Lamb ; but as a leader 
bringing popular opinion up to the point wdiere the 
methodisers could take up the work, lu- did invaluable 
service, which must not be underestimated now. 

When first heard on a serious theme, Carlile im- 
pressed one with his eloquence and power. In time the 



CARLILE THE LEADER. 577 

listener to frequent speeches perceived his limitations. He 
was not a Mirabeau in profundity, nor in the overmaster- 
ing force which sweeps men away from all their moorings 
of him who for a time carried the secret burdens of France 
— alike of the Revolution and of the imbecile monarchy 
tottering towards the guillotine — on his Atlantean shoul- 
ders. 

Carlile was a native Virginian, born at AYinchcster 
and self-educated. His father was a lawyer of brilliancy 
and power ; his mother a Marshall of the line of the Chief 
Justice. After he had studied law he crossed the moun- 
tains and began the practice at Beverly. He finally set- 
tled at Clarksburg, which had long been the seat of a re- 
fined social circle and an able bar. In 1855 he went to the 
House of Eepresentatives on the Know-Nothing wave, and 
at the end of his term returned to his law practice. After 
later vicissitudes, he returned to his old home and friends 
at Clarksburg and there ended his life in 1878. 

When Mr. Carlile was chosen to the Senate in the 
Summer of 1861, he was at the zenith of his fame. He 
was the idol of the Union j)eople of Western Virginia. 
He had caught the commendatory notice of the whole coun- 
try as the Virginia champion of the Union who had 
snatched a loyal State from the Avreck of the Old Do- 
minion. He possessed the confidence of the administration 
and of the Union majority in both houses of Congress. 
No man in the country in civil life had at that moment a 
greater future within his reach. Truly, like Wolsey, he 
had blossomed and bore his blushing honors thick upon 
him. But in an evil hour he seems to have listened to the 
suggestions of the tempter, and when he fell it was like 
Lucifer, never to rise again. 

Va.-37 



578 THE BENDING OF VIEGINIA. 



DANIEL LAMB— TEE MADISON OF WEST VIR- 
GINIA. 

The people of Western Virginia, in their emergency, 
were fortunate in having the co-operation and services of 
Daniel Lamb, v^^ho had given up the law some years before 
and at the opening of the war was cashier of the N^orth- 
western Bank at Wheeling. He was sought out by those 
who needed his help in the public emergency; and busy 
as he was in his responsible post, he gave it without stint. 

Mr. Lamb's mind, by nature or through training, or 
both, was peculiarly logical and legal. He was judicial in 
temper ; could see the merit of a thing not his own ; was 
always ready to help along the measures or ideas of his 
friends, though they might differ from his own, and to 
put them in the best shape for presentation. 

At the opening of the movement in the l^orthwest 
there was a lack of digested plan not surprising in such 
an emergency, painfully, evident in the May Convention. 
The determination was hot enough, and the object obvi- 
ous enough, but the way was not yet clear. All soon came- 
to see that Mr. Carlile's first plan of setting up a State 
government for the Korthwest and finding the authority 
afterwards, would not do; and he soon saw this himself; 
but what would do was not so easily worked out. To Mr. 
Lamb more than to any other one, I believe, is due the 
credit of solving the problem. It was his far-seeing com- 
prehension and his power of putting things together in or- 
derly sequence which found a way through the obscuiities 



THE V/EST VIRGINIA MADISON. 



579 




Daniel Lamb. 

of a situation that afforded no precedents. He, beyond 
all others, was able to think out connectedly the successive 
legal steps necessary on the untrodden way before them. 
Mr. Carlile's plans were only provisional, perhaps revolu- 
tionary. Others had fragmentary ideas of measures neces- 
sary — glimpses of the path along which they sought to ad- 
vance. Mr. Lamb planned for regularity and permanence ; 
and it was his clear discernment of the legal bearings of 
the successive measures needed which blazed the way 
through the obscurity. 

Judge Cranmer of Wheeling, an associate at the bar 
and life-long friend of Mr. Lamb, wrote me after this 
estimate of Mr. Lanib had been written : "I have been 



580 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

astonished that such meager mention has been made of 
the man who was really the main factor in the accom- 
plishment of the work of the Convention, and who was con- 
sulted and advised with before any important steps were 
taken." 

Mr. Lamb frankly avowed himself against the ]^ew 
State measure at the time it was brought forward, deem- 
ing the time and circumstances inopportune ; but with 
equal frankness and the sincerity characteristic of him, he 
declared that if the Convention chose a different course, 
he should "join heartily, fairly and honestly in carrying 
out their wishes." And that is exactly what he did. But 
if the reorganization of Virginia had not been laid on 
the unassailable foundations of legal and constitutional 
regularitv prepared by him, the procedure for the I^ew 
State must have fallen to the ground, for it did not lack 
enemies lying in wait to overthrow it at every stage. 

All familiar with the work of those years in the con- 
ventions and in the Legislature of the Xew State, wherever 
Mr. Lamb took a hand,- know what an indefatigable and 
admirable draftsman he was. He was the Madison of that 
time — and the comparison is quite as much to the credit 
of Mr. Madison as of Mr. Lamb. His mastery of every 
subject he touched was surprising; his facility in the exe- 
cution of work unequalled. Every document he drew, 
down to the smallest detail, seemed to have been shaped in 
his mind before he began to put it on paper ; and in writ- 
ing, each detail fell into place with the ease and preci- 
sions of well-trained battalions. Besides the ordinances 
of the earlier conventions, much of Mr. Lamb's work went 
into the constitution. Here Mr. Van Winkle was a very 



THE WEST VIRGINIA MADISON. 581 

able second, fitted both bj his abilities and by his studies 
in connection with the Virginia Convention of 1850-51 for 
such work. In the first West Virginia House of Dele- 
gates, which sat in continuous session five or six months 
after the inauguration of the State, remodeling old stat- 
utes and making new ones to fit the new constitution, the 
bulk of this work was put upon Mr. Lamb, who performed 
it cheerfully and faultlessly. Every morning at the open- 
ing he would come into the House with a budget of bills, 
written in his dainty chirography — faultless in punctua- 
tion, paragraphing and arrangement; the lines written 
just a little above the ruling so that they looked as if 
faintly underscored — and the wonder all felt was not only 
as Goldsmith puts it, how one head could contain it all, 
but where lie ever found the time and strength to perform 
the labor. The type-writer was yet unknown. The work 
was done so quietly that his associates scarcely realized or 
appreciated the magnitude of the labor, the quality of the 
work turned out or the unselfish sacrifice of him by whom 
it was done. ISTo committee chairman who rose to explain 
his measures could put his explanation into so few, so 
terse, so clear and convincing sentences. Mr. Lamb made 
not the least pretence at oratory. He spoke quietly, 
earnestly, with little gesture or inflection, seeking only to 
express his thoughts; and these he stated with the same 
lucidity and precision as he did on paper. There was 
nothing redundant, nothing for captandum. He was in all 
things, speaking or writing, the same plain, sincere, un- 
pretending yet wise and able counsellor. 



582 THE BENDING OF VIRGINIA. 



CAMPBELL, THE PIONEER. 

The one man who exercised a powerful and enduring 
influence on the fortunes of Northwestern Virginia — ^who 
■went beyond any other in moulding public opinion towards 
the result — a free and separate State — but who does not 
appear among the professional artificers of the structure, 
nor among those who enjoyed the honors and emoluments 
of success, was Archibald W. Campbell, editor of the 
Wheeling Intelligencer. Like Peirpoint, with whom he 
was always in close touch, Mr. Campbell was a poor poli- 
tician. Both were too earnest and single minded to give 
themselves to self-seeking. Peirpoint accepted a post and 
duty surrounded with danger and rather shunned than 
sought by his contemporaries ; and having served the pub- 
lic ends in this difficult place, in a most trying time, with 
scanty thanks from those he most dii^ctly served — with- 
out trying to promote his own personal fortunes — he went 
back when his thankless task was finished, and he had been 
made the victim of a legislative Frankenstein at Rich- 
mond, to his modest home by the Monongahela and sat 
down again to earn his bread and butter as an attorney. 
Impelled by a kindred sincerity and devotedness of pur- 
pose, Mr. Campbell gave himself without reserve to the 
work of educating and preparing the people of Northwest- 
ern Virginia for the high destiny he had faith to believe 
awaited them. When the time of fruition came — as it did 
in an unexpected way — ^he left it to others more adroit, 
less deserving — less scrupulous possibly — to reap the har- 
vest he had sown. 



1 




Archibald W. Campbell. 



(583) 



584 THE REXDIXG OF VIRGIIVIA. 

Mr. Campbell came of good stock, and combined in 
his make-np a fine quality of brains with an ever finer 
probity — the "invincible probity" which Emerson at- 
tributes to Montaigne. In his paternal ancestry- there was 
blended the sturdy, conscientious Scotch-Irish with a 
strain of French Huguenot — a heredity likely to tell for 
force and brilliancy; which may explain the traits that in 
Mr. Campbell's career were best known to his contempora- 
ries. On his mother's side, he came of an old New Eng- 
land ancestry of genuine Puritan breeding. 

At Bethany College Mr. Campbell laid the foundation 
for the liberal education to which every year of his busy 
and studious life made additions. A term at a law school 
where he sat at the feet of that Gamaliel of free-soil, Will- 
iam H. Seward, probably helped give to his political 
thought a direction in consonance with his innate- princi- 
ples. He began newspaper work in 1856 on the Intelli- 
gencer and later in the same year joined John F. Mc- 
Dermot, then printing Bishop CampbelFs "Millenial Har- 
binger," at Bethany, in the purchase of the Intelligencer. 
At that time it being understood the new proprietors ex- 
pected to make a Republican paper, it was predicted that 
within six months their press would be in the Ohio Biver. 
The five years that followed were years of struggle for ex- 
istence ; but it was a case of the survival of the fittest. The 
young editor, wiser than his years, laid out a programme 
of deliberate, cautious, steadfast advocacy of free-soil prin- 
ciples. He took the highest ground on the Republican side 
of American politics — then just beginning to stir pro- 
foundly the moral consciousness of the Xorth — and main- 
tained it with a dignity and ability that commanded the 



CAMPBELL^ THE PIONEER. 585 

respect of enemies and tlie confidence of friends. In a 
pro-slavery community, in a slave State, at a period when 
the oligarchy controlled the N^ational government and 
silenced public opinion even in the North, it seemed a 
perilous venture to try to establish an anti-slavery journal 
in the Panhandle of Virginia. Yet courage born of con- 
viction is a wonderful solvent of difficult problems. 
Though through these years, many a week did not know 
where the money was to come from to pay the Saturday 
composition strings, or the next paper bill, yet somehow 
it came, like the manna in the wilderness ; and each morn- 
ing this brave John the Baptist continued to proclaim in 
that corner of Virginia the gospel of freedom, which was 
not many years thence to possess that land. The paper 
lived; the editor did not recant his faith; the public, 
despite the threats of the ruffianly element which had its 
inspiration in Richmond, continued to tolerate, to endure, 
finally to approve and j^atronize. It was a day of small 
things, but better days and larger results were to come. 

When the crisis was reached at Richmond, in the 
Spring of 1861, Mr. Campbell went there and spent some 
time studying the problem at short range. He had never 
a moment's doubt as to the supreme duty of the hour; 
r.ever felt it expedient to curry favor with the aristocratic 
disloyal element either at Richmond or at home ; was not 
shaken in his loyalty to the United States by the Presi- 
dent's call for troops. There was never an instant's mis- 
giving or hesitation in making known his attitude of un- 
qualified Unionism. His paper became at once and con- 
tinued to be the exponent and medium of the loyal senti- 
ment of its section. Mr. Campbell's personal high charac- 



586 THE KENDIXG OF VIRGINIA. 

ter, his fearlessness, his bold and steadfast advocacy of 
resistance to the Richmond programme and later usurpa- 
tion, made his paper a power at home and resj^ected else- 
where as an exponent of loyal Western Virginia. 

As the evolution of events brought to the front the 
proposition for division, it found its earliest friend and 
faithfulest suj^porter in Mr. Campbell, who saw no reason 
for sejDaration from Virginia that was not equally a rea- 
son for separation from slavery. When the Convention 
which framed the constitution for the New State refused 
to incorporate in it, or even submit separately, a mild pro- 
vision for gradual emancipation, he warned them they 
were wasting their time to go to Washington with such 
an organic law. 

When the Xew State was fighting for its life at the 
JSTational capital, no one labored more effectively with 
members of the two houses, with whom he had a wide 
acquaintance. The fate of the Xew State was in the hands 
of the Republican majority in each house, and it was these 
that Mr. Campbell was able to most influentially reach. 
When Thad Stevens said he voted for admission because 
he had confidence in the people of West Virginia ''and 
I in the worthy men sent here to represent them," it was 
a tribute to Mr. Campbell and his co-laborers, among 
whom none was more widely or more favorably known 
than he. It was he more than any one else who enlisted 
the interest and aid of Bingham, the ''old man eloquent" 
of Ohio, who took West Virginia under his arm and car- 
ried us through the shoals and floods of the House. It 
was he, above all others, who waked up the sturdy old 



CAMPBELL, THE PIONEER. 587 

senator from the Western Reserve, who stood godfather 
for us in the Senate after the defection of Carlile. 

When it came to the election of senators for the Xew 
State in 1863 and again in 18 G5, some of Mr. Campbell's 
friends put forward his name; but the Legislature was 
more impressed by the names of other candidates, pressed 
in one case bj a powerful church organization, in the other 
by a railroad corporation. Mr. Campbell would not de- 
viate from his path in the least to propitiate the legis- 
lative gentlemen — indeed, had not long before criticised 
them sharpl}' for taking pay during a recess. Public 
bodies, like some other bodies, are grateful for things to 
come rather than for things past. Mr. Campbell's claims 
to their consideration lay on a level rather too high for 
the average legislative appreciation. He could help other 
people into the Senate but he could not — or would not — 
help himself in the least. 

After Mr. Campbell's death, the editor of the Intelli- 
gencer was moved to say: 

It is no exaggeration to say that no State owed a man 
so Tnv.ch and paid so little of the obligation; that no man 
worked so unselfishly for the consummation of an object and 
received so few of the rewards for honorable efforts and con- 
spicuous success. These lines are not written in the sense of a 
reproach but in justice to truth. This lack of tangible gratitude 
on the part of the State has many explanations which would 
perhaps be in bad taste in these columns. 

It should not be inferred from this that Mr. Campbell 
did not enjoy the popular confidence and esteem, for he 
did in an eminent degree. 



588 THE EENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

In his later career, he was as capable and successful in 
business and affairs as he had been admirable as a leader 
of public opinion. A student all his life, he grew in 
intellectual riches and power with every year ; and in later 
years rounded out his accomplishments, knowledge and 
character by extensive travel. 

While he took no part in "practical*' politics, he main- 
tained a kindly attitude towards political friends and was 
always ready to holyi them and to promote policies he be- 
lieved in the interest of the public. Xo man more thor- 
oughly possessed throughout the State the respect of peo- 
ple of all parties. His attitude towards the West Virginia 
public was one of dignity and independence, but of amity 
and co-operation with political friends. He did not need 
to engage in politics for a livelihood, but he never lost his 
solicitude for the upbuilding of the State he had done 
so much to found. John H. Atkinson, one of the few sur- 
vivors of the times and labors in which Mr. Campbell's 
earlier years were spent, and who was on terms of inti- 
mate friendship with him and in full sympathy with his 
anti-slavery attitude and worlc, says to me in a letter just 
received, that "Campbell was the leading spirit in West 
Virginia, with whom I rejoiced in every triumph that 
came to the Union cause and to the cause of human 
liberty." 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

CAPTUBE AND ESCAPE OF CONGRESSMAN WHALEY. 

Kellian V. Whalev, member of the House of Repre- 
sentatives, who had been commissioned Major by Governor 
Peirpoint and authorized to recruit a regiment, had made 
his headquarters at Guyandotte, Cabell County, his home 
town. He had enlisted about 150 men, when a raid was 
made on Guyandotte, Xovember 10, 1861, by Jenkins and 
Clarkson, with 1,200 cavalry. Whaley was taken prisoner, 
but after almost incredible hardships escaped. His men 
had made a stubborn fight and he himself was taken in the 
street with a musket in his hand which he had just fired. 
An account of the fight in the Ironton (O.) Clipper^ writ- 
ten by two of his captains, Turner and Battin, said : 

A company headed by Capt. H. C. Pate, of Kansas notoriety, 
came rushing through the street, and Colonel Whaley, after firing 
his gun, was surrounded and taken prisoner. The rebels rushed 
upon him crying, "Kill the damned Abolitionist!" and presented 
their guns, and one attempted to fire at his breast while he was 
being held by the arms by two men, but the gun missed fire. 
Captain Pate in a loud voice demanded to know of him where his 
men were, threatening to kill him if he did not tell. * * * 
Colonel Whaley refused positively to give him the desired in- 
formation, replying: "You will find them soon enough." The 
men still continued to threaten his life when Colonel Clarkson 

5&9 



590 THE EENDING OF VIKGIXIA. 

rode up and asked if he was Colonel Whaley. Whaley replied 
that he was not a Colonel, though in command of the post. 
Clarkson then commanded his men not to kill him and re- 
marked: "He is a brave man and I design to so report him." 

Major Whaley visited Wheeling December 4tli. His 
story as told to the editor of the Intelligencer and related 
in the columns of that paper was substantially as follows : 

He was taken prisoner in the street with the others. As 
they passed through Barboursville, he saw a large number of 
Union men tied along the roadside awaiting the arrival of the 
cavalry. They left Guyandotte Monday, and during that day 
marched forty miles without a bite to eat. Many of the 
prisoners fainted from weakness and from the inhuman manner 
in which they were forced along on foot. Whaley begged Jen- 
kins to take them and himself -out into the fields and shoot 
them as preferable to the slow torture they were compelled to 
endure. After that the prisoners were mounted. 

During that day a messenger overtook the cavalry and 
reported that Colonel Zeigler (Federal commander) had killed 
several Secessionists in Guyandotte and fired the town. This 
so enraged the rebels that they rushed upon Whaley and his men 
crying: "Kill the damned Abolition scoundrels!" And it was 
only through the exertions of Colonel Clarkson that the lives of 
the prisoners were saved. 

At a point near Chapmanville, Whaley was left in charge 
of rebel Captain Witcher's company. About three in the morn- 
ing Whaley awoke and found the guard of eight men all 
asleep. He took Witcher's hat and his own shoes, lifted the 
latch of the door and finding all clear outside ran for his 
life a couple of hundred yards down to the Guyandotte River. 
Here he stopped and put on his shoes and finding no other 
means of crossing the river swam it. He went a mile or so 
down the river and then left it and climbed the mountain, the 
summit of which he reached at daybreak, just as Witcher was 
firing guns as a signal of his escape. Knowing it would be 
fatal to attempt to travel by daylight, he sought a thicket of 
red-oak brush in which he found a sort of path. He was wet. 



CAPTURE AND ESCAPE OF WHALEY. 591 

had no coat, a bleak wind was blowing and he was nearly perish- 
ing from cold, and he had to keep in rapid motion to keep him- 
self warm and save his life. Back and forth over this path 
in this thicket he walked all day, much as David Crockett once 
saved himself from perishing one bitter night by climbing up 
and sliding down a tree. 

When night came, Whaley started down the Guyandotte 
Valley; but had scarcely proceeded two miles when he came 
upon a camp of rebel cavalry. Next day he took a circuit on 
the hill-tops. On Hart's Creek, he came to the house of an old 
lady named Adkins, whose son and son-in-law were with her. 
Young Adkins agreed to conduct him to Keyser's Creek for two 
dollars; and when they started Whaley observed that the son- 
in-law started in another direction. Suspecting that Thompson 
knew him and fearing pursuit, Whaley hurried Adkins along a 
good deal faster than the young man desired. Arriving at 
Keyser's Creek, Whaley having been robbed of all his money 
could not comply with his agreement. He gave Adkins twenty- 
five cents, all the money he had, and his shoes, which were new 
and good, in exchange for his guide's old moccasins. Whaley 
struck down the creek, but had not gone far before he heard the 
tramp of cavalry in pursuit. He had barely time to jump over 
a fence and lie flat on his belly, when along dashed a com- 
pany of cavalry headed by Thompson. He was lying not six 
feet from them as they passed; and if they had not been looking 
so intently forward in momentary expectation of catching sight 
of him in the road, they must have seen him behind the 
fence. Whaley says he "stuck closer to the ground than ever 
a bat on a wall." He crawled up a ravine, where he spent 
another twelve hours exposed to a hard rain. Being by this 
time very faint and weak, having been thirty-six hours without 
food, he determined to approach a house he saw a short distance 
ahead and ask for something to eat. He waded a creek about 
waist-deep, picked up a couple of boulders for defense if neces- 
sary, and going to the house spoke to the occupants. He was 
answered by the man of the house — a Union man — who recog- 
nized him at once and warned him not to remain a moment as 
the cavalry had been there hunting for him. Whaley offered 
the man five hundred dollars to conduct him to the Queea 



592 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

settlement and to the house of Absalom Queen. The man, al- 
though avowing himself a good Union man refused the offer, 
saying that he would be killed by his neighbors if discovered. 
He, however, gave Whaley a blanket to throw over his shiver- 
ing shoulders, and directed him how to find the house of Queen. 

When he at last reached Queen's, he found a home-guard 
of twenty-five men; and here, for the first time, he got some- 
thing to eat. Queen and eleven of his men accompanied 
Whaley; and, traveling only at night, they crossed the Tug Fork 
of Big Sandy into Kentucky; stopped at the house of Roland 
Sammon until night; and then moved down the river in a boat, 
reaching the forks of Big Sandy before midnight. There they 
found encamped the command of Col. Laban Moore, member of 
Congress from the Ninth Kentucky district. The party reached 
the mouth of Big Sandy Sunday at noon, where they were re- 
ceived with great rejoicing. 

Whaley gave each of Queen's men an Enfield rifle, a 
thousand rounds of ammunition, and a lot of various necessaries, 
as a return for their devotion to him and to the Union cause. 
Absalom Queen had been a soldier in the War of 1812, and 
was a true-blue Unionist. There were about two hundred Union 
men in the settlement where he lived, and through his influence 
a hundred of them were in Colonel Zeigler's Fifth (Union) regi- 
ment. 



CHAPTER XXV. 

MILITARY VALUE OF WESTERN VIRGINIA IN THE 

WAR. 

The reorganization of the Virginia government at 
Wheeling and the formation of a State devoted to free soil 
and the Union, at the time these things were done, were 
of enormous advantage to the Union cause. Mr. Lincoln 
said once that this Virginia movement was worth more "") 
the government than an armv with banners. Mr. Sumner 
said in the Senate on the question of admitting the New 
State : "Perhaps no question of greater importance has 
ever been presented to the Senate. It concerns the whole 
(piestion of slavery; it concerns also the question of Stair 
rights ; it concerns also the results of this war. Look at it, 
therefore, in any aspect you please, and it is a great ques- 
tion." Mr. Bingham said, in closing the debate in the 
House of Representatives: "It is an inroad, if you pass 
this bill, Avhich will become permanent and enduring, into 
that ancient Bastile of slavery out of which has come this 
wild, horrid conflict of arms which stains this distracted 
land of ours this day with the blood of our children." 
Mr. Seward said "the harmony and peace of the Union" 
would be promoted by allowing the Xew State to take jur- 
isdiction of the west slope of the Alleghenies supplanting 
control by "a political power concentrated at the head of 
the James River." Mr. Stanton said that "by the erection 

Va.-38 503 



594 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

of the Xew State the geographical boundary heretofore 
existing between the free and slave States will be broken 
and the advantage of this from every point of considera- 
tion" exceeded all objections. The New Yovl- Times said: 
''Virginia in rebellion, one-half her territory gravitates 
by kindred attraction to the x^orth. Already is a victory 
gained which is conclusive of the whole contest. A terri- 
tory equal in area to a first-class State is thrown off from 
the South by mere force of repulsion. It can never be 
reclaimed." 

This with reference to political aspects. The military 
value of the movement has not perhaps been so generally 
appreciated as it ought. Plans at Eichmond and at Mont- 
gomery contemplated the speedy occupation of Western 
Virginia by the Confederate forces. The check to Gar- 
nett's army and the subsequent occupation of the moun- 
tain inlets saved the Xorthwest very early in the fight; 
and it was Rosencranz, who had captured Rich Mountain 
and cut off Garnett's communications, who made Wise's 
occupancy of the Kanawha untenable, and maneuvred 
rather than fought him out of the country. The South- 
west might have been spared Wise, just as the Xorthwest 
was Garnett, if troops had been sent into the KanaAvha 
Valley as promptly as they were into the Tygart Valley. 
We have described in another chapter what ravage was 
suffered in the Southwest ; and therein we have a picture 
of what might have happened in the Northwest but for the 
early invitation to Federal troops and their instant re- 
sponse. Xot only was the IS^orthwest spared despoilment 
but weightier consequences resulted. It gave Ohio and 
the western border of Pennsylvania the Allegheny Moun- 



MILITARY VALUK OF WEST VIRGINIA. 595 

tains for a "frontier." If McClellan had met Confederate 
armies at the Ohio River, he might never have become 
the "Young- Napoleon of the West," and a good deal of the 
history of the war might have been different. Once those 
armies had camped on. the east bank of the Ohio — even 
if we take no account of the moral and political effect in 
the Northern States, it would have made a very different 
militaiy situation from what was actually confronted. If 
the Confederates could have established themselves on the 
Ohio, their aim must then have been to cross the Inindred 
iriles lying between the northern extremity of Virginia 
and Lake Erie, to cut the great east and west lines of rail- 
way which were the military arteries of the Union. The 
disabling of the Fort Wayne, the Steubenville & Indiana, 
the Atlantic & Great Western and the Lake Shore Roads, 
even temporarily, would have been a frightful disaster — 
more deadly than the closing of the Mississippi ; for the 
circulation in that narrow neck between East and West 
was more vital than that by the great river. Such a sever- 
ance would have divided the military power of the North 
fatally if maintained for any considerable time. The 
achievement of this would have been an object of supreme 
effort, on the one hand, and of unexampled resistance on 
the other. That upper Ohio region would have become the 
center of the struggle. If the main Confederate effort had 
been made in this quarter instead of w^asting itself in 
Eastern Virginia against an impregnable wall, the event 
might have told a different story. The time to attack in 
this quarter w^ould have been at the initiative, before the 
North could have organized to meet the assault, even be- 
fore they could realize the blow that was intended. 



596 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

Howell Cobb, president of the Montgomery govern- 
ment, looked forward to the occupation of West Virginia. 
He said in a speech at Montgomery that the people of the 
Gulf States need have no fear that the war would roll their 
way; that they might plant their cotton in security, for 
"the theater of war," he said, "will be along the Ohio and 
in Virginia." This may have been thrown out merely to 
soothe the nerves of the Cotton-State chivalry ; and there 
is no evidence that the rebel plans ever contemplated any 
bolder stroke in that quarter than the occupation of Vir- 
ginia to the Ohio. But if that had been done successfully, 
raids across the territory north of the river would have 
been the next logical military venture. 

When laymen undertake to express ideas about military 
strategy, they must, of course, do so with due recognition 
of the absurdity of ideas at variance from the settled form- 
ulas of the military schools. Yet the greatest campaign in 
the West during the rebellion was planned by a woman, 
an employe, I believe, in one of the departments at Wash- 
ington. The facts are undeniable ; but it would have de- 
tracted from the glory of the hero of the hour to confess 
the truth, and the truth was suppressed. 

It is the unexpected that wins in war, as in other fields 
of effort. When Napoleon started out as the thunderbolt 
of beleaguered France, he left behind him the accepted, 
but for him obsolete, methods of his contemporaries and 
took the military world by surprise. His genius consisted 
in getting on the ground first, with the longest guns and 
the largest battalions. In no other field of human enter- 
prise is the "instant way" more vital to success than in 
war. The South had been for years getting ready; and 



MILITARY VALUE OF WEST VIRCtINIA. 597 

yet with the total want of preparation in the N^orth, — with 
arsenals and armories depleted to supply those in the 
South ; with the regular army reduced to seventeen thou- 
sand men ; and with a general belief that the South was 
only blustering and did not really mean to fight — the Con- 
federates were from the start the invaded, not the invaders. 
With their preparation and premeditation, they might 
have taken the Xorth by surprise; might by bold and in- 
stant invasion at the vulnerable point have so anticipated 
its readiness for attack as to have produced a momentary 
paralysis — possibly have created such confusion and panic 
as to have dictated terms of separation before the I^orth 
could have organized resistance or recovered equilibrium. 
That would seem to have been the w^ay to begin a success- 
ful war. This was the kind of opening to expect from a 
people who prided themselves on their military temper 
and prowess. Courage they did not lack; but there was a 
lack of military audacity and genius which made the re- 
bellion a foredoomed failure from the day its generals 
permitted themselves to be put on the defensive. Along 
with the government muskets the rebellion stole the govern- 
ment's West Point officers, trained to believe war could 
not be waged except within the formulas of the books. 
What did Attilla or Zenghis Kahn care for the methods of 
military schools ? And what might not have happened 
if the South had at the opening had ready some such 
leader with an army secretly organized,N ready for instant 
mobilization, to follow him into the "enemy's country ?" 
The recognition of opportunity is the privilege, the 
seizure of it the proof, of genius. Fortunes are made or 
marred, campaigns and countries lost or won, powers and 



598 THE BENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

principalities established or overthrown, according as the 
opportune moment is seized or lost. The Confederates 
lost their opportunity in Northwestern Virginia. It was 
the vice of their slave civilization that even under the tre- 
mendous stimulus of war their enterprises were all tainted 
with the ineffectiveness of their methods of thought and 
business. There was too much strutting and preening; 
too much thought of display for its effect on the world at 
large ; too much orating and premature self-glorification 
over results not yet achieved. There was too little cold- 
blooded calculation — too little of that far-reaching au- 
dacity which is not afraid to reach out beyond the accepted 
methods of ordinary men and means — to "dare, and again 
dare, and without end dare," in the words of the 
"lost Titan" of the French revolution. The daring of 
the Confederates only once rose above the level of a merely 
defensive war, though no country in the world offered a 
richer spoil than the North; and the experience of that 
exception showed them how unequal they were to anything 
else. 



CHAPTEE XXVI. 

BENEFICENCE OF WAR— BABBARISM OF SLAVERY. 

The conflicts that convulse nations and shake down 
rock-rooted institutions are often blessings in rude dis- 
guise. In heroic treatment there must be suffering. The 
comj)ensation follows, but sometimes far behind. The 
calamity of one generation may be a godsend to the next. 
The blood of the martyrs was the seed of the church. One 
generation plants ; the next reaps ; but the thread of 
human sacrifice and recompense runs through all. The 
river is made up of drojjs, but it is a continuous stream. 
Human society likewise is a continuing body. Individuals 
appear and disappear, men come and go, but the stream 
of life, achievement and purpose flows on forever. 

So whatever may be individual wrong, suffering and 
loss, the body of the people in their social and political 
structure, may as a whole be the gainer. The temporary 
calamities of war may pave the way to a beneficent recom- 
pense. Civil Wars are most apt to do this, for they are 
usually fought over some principle in whose triumph there 
is a vindication and establishment of justice. Age after 
age, England through her internecine strifes emerged from 
each to a higher level of intellectual and religious liberty. 

Nations in peaceful times grow up to their opportuni- 
ties. The opportunities themselves mostly come through 
violence. The portion of peoples, as of individuals, comes 

599 



600 THE KENDING OF VIEGINIA. 

to tliem by irregular allotment, not always recognized nor 
welcome at the time. The tendency of society, as of men, 
is to grow into grooves ; and through the natural aggress- 
iveness of all evil things, the innate inertness of harmless 
things and the inclination of people to non-resistance, the 
ruts into which the affairs of every people run if left to 
themselves, are oppressive to popular liberty and progress. 
A sort of crust grows around institutions, as the moss 
grows on the undisturbed stone. Social and political life 
becomes bound in the habit of acquiescence in wrong. 
When a people have become thus enmeshed through long 
periods of indolence, nothing but the splendid, energizing 
shock of war can save them from worse calamities. 

In his "History of Civilization in Europe," Guizot de- 
scribes how immensely Europe was broadened, educated, 
liberalized as the result of the Crusades, with their two 
centuries of waste in life and treasure, through the intel- 
lectual impulse resulting from the contact of the Western 
nations with the superior civilization and refinement of the 
Asiatics. "On the one hand," he says, "the extension of 
Vj ideas and the emancipation of thought ; on the other, gen- 
eral enlargement of the social sphere and the opening of a 
wider field for every sort of activity; at the same time, 
more complete freedom and more political unity ; the inde- 
pendence of men and the centralization of society. They 
drew society out of a very narrow rut and threw it into 
new and infinitely broader paths." K'othing in the pre- 
vious history of Europe had carried it so far on the road 
to intellectual development as those two hundred years of 
war and sacrifice, which constituted the crowning struggle 



INFLUENCE OF CEUSADES IN EUKOPE. GOl 

between the Christian and Mahommedan systems — a strug- 
gle which began when the Saracens crossed into Spain six 
or seven centuries before, established themselves in that 
peninsula and threatened seriously to subdue and possess 
all Europe. Dr. Draper says of the influence exercised 
by the crusades : ''Coming indiscriminately from all 
classes of communities that were scarcely elevated above 
barbarism, the crusaders were suddenly brought in contact 
with people inhabiting countries that for ages had been the 
seats of civilization. Their ideas were not only enlarged 
but their very style of thinking was changed. Whoever 
escaped the perils of these religious enterprises became on 
his return to his native place an influential and authorita- 
tive teacher. There was a weakening of the force of those 
maxims that heretofore had been a guide, society relieving 
ilself of the stress of former modes of thought. It may be 
doubted whether that great religious movement known as 
the Reformation would have been possible had it not been 
for the occurrence of the crusades." 

The words of these writers not unfitly describe the 
effects wrought by the Civil War in the Southern half of 
this Republic. That region for more than a century had 
been barricaded against the enlightening and humanizing 
influences which had been doing their work in the ISTorth- 
ern half as in other enlightened countries. 'Kow the bar- 
riers which had lain for more than a hundred years across 
the path of liberty and progress were burned away. Until 
the crusades there was no Europe in tlie sense of intellec- 
tual or other unity. The States were petty, feudal, pro- 
vincial ; divided by ignorance of and consequent prejudice 
against each other, without community of thought or aim. 



602 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

From their contact with the Eastern World resulted a 
compact and comparatively homogeneous Europe, to a 
great extent free from local prejudice and religious big- 
otry. In a similar way, the overthrow of slavery and the 
educating contact with Northern armies swept away the 
provincial spirit that had been bred in the South by slav- 
ery. At the same time it released the Xorth from the 
political bondage which for decades they had accepted as 
the price of peace and quiet. 

Despite the struggles and sacrifice among the original 
States for unity, and despite the Constitution which was 
assumed to have effected it, there was never any real unity 
in the country till produced by the War of the Rebellion. 
The Constitution left in the Southern half of the Republic 
an institution alien to the genius of our people and form 
of government — a Republic with an absolute and irrespon- 
sible despotism within it — a system at war with the spirit 
of modern civilization ; offensive to lustice and violative 
of the moral sense of mankind ; an institution which could 
not from its nature and the necessities of its existence be 
content even to be let alone much less subjected to gradual 
extinction ; a living and active antagonist to free society ; 
a constant and growing provocative of the irrepressible 
conflict which could never end but by the overthrow of one 
or other of the irreconcilable systems. Mason and Dixon's 
line was as real ^ division as if it had been a frontier be- 
tween foreign peoples. It came at last to the point where 
the deadly issue could no longer be postponed, disguised 
or compromised. The South driven by the logic of their 
attitude as promoters of slavery had to make Avar for its 
extension. The result was the removal forever of this ele- 



EFFECTS OF CIVIL WARS. 603 

ment of dissension and the emergence of a Republic with 
one supreme vindicated authority and a compact citizen 
ship embracing the hitherto subject race. Perhaps this 
result ought to be stated with some qualification, for the 
irritation still lingers in the South and the result is there 
only submitted to under protest. But we are yet not half 
a century away from the convulsion, and time and com- 
merce will ultimately allay the surviving race irritation. 
Bryce in his "American Commonwealth," remarks that 
"the Southern States will long retain the imprint of slav- 
ery, not merely in the presence of a host of negroes but in 
the degradation of the poor-white population and in certain 
attributes, laudable as well as regretable, of the ruling 
class." Dr. Draper, on the other hand, regards the exist- 
ing alienation in the South as transient. "There is a 
great difference," he remarks, "between civil and foreign 
wars as respects the permanence of the feelings that en- 
gender. History is full of examples how speedily the 
feuds of a Civil "War die away. Man is so constituted that 
he spontaneously resigns to oblivion his unsuccessful un- 
dertakings. The vanquished in a civil strife avoids a 
recollection of his disappointed hopes. The victor abstains 
from a contemplation of his success ; he feels that he can 
afford to forget even glory; and so the memory of such 
events speedily passes away. New objects, new motives, 
new pursuits are presented and society starts again on a 
new basis. How brief a space it took in the old times to 
obliterate all memory of the awful civil wars of the Roman 
Empire — in later times, of those of England. It will take 
a still shorter period to do the same in the activity of 
human life in America." 



604 THE EEIS^DIXG OF VIKGINIA. 

The phrase that helps make the caption of this chapter 
is not my own, as the reader knows. It was Charles Sum- 
ner who held up before the world the "barbarism of slav- 
ery ;" and his famous phillipic brought swift proof of its 
truth in the bludgeon of ''Bully Brooks." As the result of 
Brooks' argument, Mr. Sumner was absent from his place 
in the Senate for four years. When, after his return, he 
first rose to speak in the Senate his opening words were: 
"Time has passed, but the question remains." Time has 
passed again. Sumner is gone ; slavery is gone ; the lesson 
only remains. 

Slavery was a monstrosity — at once crime and blunder. 
The shadow of it fell with baleful umbrage on the minds 
of men throughout the republic. It was not alone the 
planter's neighbor, under the palmetto or beside the cane 
or cotton field, who was constrained of his liberty of 
speech. The politician in N^ew England, in the Northwest, 
in the Border States and the Middle Free States, in the 
ISTational Capital, on the Pacific Coast — wherever he 
might be under the Constitution which was invoked to 
vivify this political monster, and under the base statute 
which undertook to make every citizen its servant — found 
the same shadow fall athwart his path ; and through him, 
Avith its power to make or mar his political fortunes, its 
chill extended to all his friends. Now men are able to see 
with clear eyes and unconstrained minds, in the light of 
truth which they are no longer afraid of, what cowards 
and slaves they themselves used to be. It is hard to realize 
in the nobler political freedom of today how great con- 
ventions used to be held, and spectacular tableaux pre- 
pared, expressly to convince the truculent slave-masters in 



CO:VDITIOXS IN THE SOUTH. 605 

the South that Xorthern merchants and manufacturers — 
and politicians — were but too happy to be door-mats for 
them. The specter of slavery sat in every N'ational Con- 
vention of every party, like the skeleton at the feast ; and 
none dared forget its presence for a moment. 

The case in the South is far from hopeless. The revo- 
lution left its sequela there in new industrial problems, 
with the race problem in new shape, acute and trying ; but 
it left the white people, as well as the dark, on a new 
level, dependent on their own energies, freed in their new 
relationship to the world from the old trammels ; no longer 
bound by the caste of race, ready to rise above it as time 
and development of both races prepare the way. The in- 
tellectual vision of the Southern white people is broad- 
ened, their thoughts lifted to a nobler future ; and in time, 
one must have faith, the new problems they are compelled 
to meet will be solved adequately and worthily, however 
unpromising may seem from time to time the old race an- 
tipathy. The white people there have been emancipated 
as well as the black. Their thought is no longer limited 
by the needs of an institution upon which the light of 
knowledge must not be permitted to shine. The younger 
generation are growing up in forgetfulness, if not igno- 
rance, of the things that constrained their fathers. They 
are learning business, taking a place in the world's com- 
merce ; becoming nationalized ; no longer citizens of a sec- 
tion devoted to special aims and interests, they have be- 
come citizens of the Republic. It is true, with a numerous 
class there still rankles the old race hatred and sense of 
injury; but it is also true that the educated class, with a 
broader and better outlook, are growing up to their new 



606 THE RENDING OF VIEGINIA. 

responsibilities; and this higher stratum, with its higher 
morality and worthier aims, will ultimately give direction 
to Southern thought and find a way to an endurable rela- 
tion with the dark race. 

The influence of American slavery was not confined to 
tlie morals and politics of the United States. Public men 
in other countries, through commercial interests involved, 
were brought into subservience to it. In England, whose 
commercial relations with the Cotton-States were impor- 
tant and dependent, this deference was most pronounced. 
The need of cheap cotton made England the apologist and 
partisan of slavery in America though abolished in her own 
colonies ; and by easy logical sequence made Englishmen 
hostile to the anti-slavery North. The manufacturers and 
aristocracy were friendly to the rebellion ; the common 
people, the working people, friendly to the North ; the 
Liberals generally for the Union, the Tories against. John 
Bright declared that ''secession was high treason against 
popular suffrage ; that refusal to submit to the election of 
Lincoln was a violation of the principle that the majority 
shall rule." Gladstone, professing to be liberal, ought to 
have been our friend but was not. His sympathies were 
limited by British interests. If he had any convictions 
regarding slavery, he was ready to sacrifice them to the 
needs of British trade. His liberalism did not reach out 
like Bright's across seas and take in the brotherhood of 
free peoples wherever he found them. He resented Amer- 
ican protection of her own industries. To judgments not 
overawed by a name it is clear enough that Gladstone was 
incapable of seeing any excellence outside his own island. 
With ample leisure and abundant wealth, he never found 



ATTITUDE OF BRITISH TORIES. 



607 



time or inclination to visit America to examine the devel- 
opment of the English plant in the soil of the N'ew World. 
He was an eminent scholar, and few monks knew as much 
about the musty ecclesiasticism of his church ; but he was 
not a statesman of the world's largest pattern. 

Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton in an address to the Hertz 
Agricultural Society in September, 1861, had this to say: 

That separation between North and South America I have 
long foreseen and foretold to be inevitable; and I venture to 
predict that the younger men here present will live to see, not 
two but at least four — and probably more than four — separate 
Southern commonwealths arising out of those populations 
which a year ago united their Legislature under one president 
and carried their merchandise under one flag. 

Lord Lytton's wish was probably father to this remark- 
able foresight. If he had been a profound economist, he 
might have perceived even then the centripetal tendency of 
the age, stimulated by increasing popular intelligence and 
by the growth of scientific knowledge ; a tendency which a 
generation later was to produce centralizations and concen- 
tration in political organization and in commerce which 
amaze and terrify publicists at the present hour. Unity, 
not disruption, was in the air even as long ago as 1861. 
Its first great victory was in the vindication of the Ameri- 
can Union. Its first striking manifestation in Europe 
came ten years later in the unification of Germany. The 
division and subdivision of the American Republic was a 
vain dream of British greed. The South and l^orth, re- 
united, continue to "unite their Legislature under one 
President and carry their merchandise under one flag;" 
and out of their new unity has arisen a power which dis- 
putes markets with the British flag in every port in the 



608 THE BENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

world — which sells prints in Manchester and steel in Shef- 
field; which challenges the industries of every country in 
Europe at its own doors ; a power to which — it is well to 
remember — England is now as deferential as she was in- 
solent in 1861. 

The average view held by the educated Tory classes in 
Great Britain during the American Rebellion was fairly 
expressed ten years before by Thomas Carlyle in a letter 
written by him to Hon, Beverly Tucker, of Williamsburg, 
Virginia, in October, 1850, in the course of which the 
Scotchman said : 

I find it a settled conviction among rational Englishmen, 
which they frequently express in a careless way, that the 
Southern States must ultimately feel driven to separate them- 
selves from the Northern; in which result there is not felt here 
to be anything treasonous or otherwise horrible. 

But he closes his letter to Mr. Tucker with this word 
of warning: 

I shall say only that the Negro Question will be left in peace 
when God Almighty's law about it is (with tolerable approxima- 
tion) actually found out and practiced; and never till then. 

t The British Tories during the Rebellion, so far from 
seeing anything "treasonous or horrible" in the dissolu- 
tion of the American Union, would have been pleased 
with such a consummation ; and the attitude of Gladstone 
shows the feeling was not confined to the Tories. The 
English government did all it dared to help disunion. In 
the subsequent settlement witli the United States, they 
paid somewhat roundly for this, though not adequately. 



THE EOOT OF NATIONAL ILLS. 609 

It may seen to the reader — and it may be true — that 
I have had more to say in these pages than was fitting or 
necessary about slavery. But, in extenuation, let it be con- 
sidered that it was slavery which lay at the root of the agi- 
tations which divided this country for three-quarters of a 
century and culminated in the calamities that over- 
M'helmed us in 1861. It was truly what Wesley called it^ 
^'the sum of all villainies." Out of it grew the inequali- 
ties and injustice which we in Western Virginia suffered 
for more than fifty years, and it was slavery which brought 
the proud old State down from its ancient grandeur to its 
later humiliation. In all the history of the republic, there 
has never been an issue which in morals or economic im- 
portance rose to the greatness of this. Even the struggle 
for independence did not involve such issues for weal or 
woe as lay in the later controversy that grew with the 
growth of the nation and cost a million lives and thousands 
of millions of treasure to compose. 



Va.— 39 



CHAPTER XXVII. 

SOUTHERN VIEWS OF THE MOVEMENT IN NORTH- 
WESTERN VIRGINIA. 

(From Pollard's Southern History.) 

With an outrage of the plainest doctrines of the government 
and a practical denial not only of everything like the rights of 
the States but even of their territorial integrity, the North- 
western portion of Virginia, which had rebelled against its 
State government, was taken into the membership of the Fed- 
eral Union as itself a State, with the absurd and childish ad- 
dition of giving to the rebellious counties the name of "Vir- 
ginia." A Convention of the disaffected Northwestern counties 
of Virginia had been held in Wheeling on the 13th of May 
and after a session of three days decided to call another Con- 
vention to meet on the 11th of June, subsequent to the vote of 
the State on the ordinance of secession. The Convention re- 
organized the counties as a member of the Federal Union, and 
F. W. Pierpont was elected Governor; W. T. Willey and the 
notorious John S. Carlile, both of whom had already signalized 
their treason to the State by their course in the Convention at 
Richmond, were sent as representatives of Virginia to the United 
States Senate, in which absurd capacity they were readily re- 
ceived. 



Jefferson Davis, in his "Rise and Fall of the Confed- 
erate Government," refers to the anti-secession movements 
in Northwestern Virginia from the same point of view as 

610 



THE CONFEDERATE POINT OF VIEW. 611 

Pollard, The June Convention was a "so-called conven- 
tion," the Constitutional Convention was also •'so-called," 
and it framed a "so-called constitution." The Legislature 
was also "so-called;" and "adopting the new Federal pro- 
cess of assumption, it assumed to be the Legislature of 
Virginia." We used to speak of Mr. Davis' own govern- 
ment as "so-called ;" and we have this advantage of him in 
the matter of epithets, that while the Confederacy never 
got beyond the "so-called" stage, the governments framed 
in Northwestern Virginia endured. The reorganized Vir- 
ginia government established by the June Convention at 
Wheeling is the government of Virginia to-day, with its 
capital at Richmond ; and West Virginia promises to be a 
great Commonwealth ages after the "so-called" President 
of tiie "so-called" Confederacy has been forgotten. 

After reciting the admission of West Virginia, Mr. 
Davis "pauses" for a moment "to consider these proceed- 
ings in the light of fundamental republican principles" — 
of which principles Mr. Davis was himself so eminent an 
exemplar ! 

The State of Virginia was not a federation but a republic 
or nation. Its government was instituted with the consent of 
the governed, and its powers, therefore, were "just powers.' 
When the State Convention at Richmond passed an ordinance of 
secession, which was subsequently ratified by 60,000 majority, 
it was as valid an act for the people of Virginia as was ever 
passed by a representative body. The legally expressed decision 
of the majority was the true voice of the State. When there- 
fore disorderly persons in the Northwestern counties of the 
State assembled and declared the ordinance of secession to be 
"null and void," they rose up against the authority of the State. 
When they proposed to elect delegates to a convention to resist 
the act of the State and that Convention assembled and organized 



612 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

and proceeded to action, an insurrection against tlie govern- 
ment of Virginia was begun. When the Convention next de- 
clared the State offices to be vacant and proceedeu to fill them by 
the choice of Francis H. Peirpoint for Governor and other State 
officers, assuming itself to be the true State Convention of Vir- 
ginia, it not only declared what notoriously did not exist but 
it committed an act of revolution. And when the so-called 
State officers elected by it entered upon their duties, they in- 
augurated a revolution. The subsequent organization of West 
Virginia and its separation from Virginia were acts of secession. 
Thus we have in these movements insurrection, revolution and 
secession. 

The fatal defect in Mr. Davis' argiuneiit is that its first 
premise is false. The act of secession was not valid. It 
was an act of revolution pure and simple. If the ordi- 
nance had been legal as passed — which under the Consti- 
tution of the United States was impossible — it could not 
be consummated and in force until ratified by the people 
of Virginia more than a month after its passage. But the 
Convention and the Confederacy waited for no such ratifi- 
cation. By a coup d'etat as infamous as that of Louis 
ISTapoleon, the ''so-called" President of the Confederacy 
took instant military possession of Virginia, under color 
of a league entered into with his fellow-conspirators at 
Richmond in violation of every principle of law and gov- 
ernment. This league violated, first, the Constitution of 
the United States ; it violated the act of Assembly calling 
and constituting the Convention, and the schedule accom- 
panying the ordinance of secession ; violated the Bill of 
Eights which forbade the erection of any foreign govern- 
ment in Virginia. It violated all the "fundamental re- 
publican principles" about which Mr. Davis became so 
solicitous after he found he was not to be hanged. This 



THE SEPAKATIOX JUSTIFIED. 613 

military seizure of Virginia put Mr. Davis iii absolute 
control of the election on the ratification of the ordinance 
and made a reign of terror at the polls on that 23d of May 
all over Virginia except in a few counties in the North- 
west. The peoi)le of Virginia had voted in February 
against secession by nearly sixty thousand majority. 
What the vote really was under the Davis reign of terror 
in May will never be known ; but the history of all civil- 
ized countries may be challenged to show a greater out- 
rage on popular rights. This book has been written in 
vain, and the history it records enacted in vain, if it does 
not clearly appear that the people of iN^orthwestern Vir- 
ginia were justified before God and man in the principles 
to which they appealed for the vindication of their rights 
and in the measures of self-preservation adopted by them. 

Gordon Battelle, in the midst of the Jeff. Davis rebel- 
lion said : "It has been the merit of other attempted revo- 
lutions that their motive at least was a reaching upward 
and forward after liberty. It is the infamy of this that 
it is a reaching downward and backward after despotism." 

It does not become the unsuccessful head of a flagrant 
and inexcusable rebellion, undertaken with no higher ob- 
ject than to perpetuate the enslavement of a subject race, 
to reproach the people who were driven to defend their 
liberties and lives against the violence invoked by him. 



CHAPTEE XXVIII. 

THE "CHILD or THE TEMPEST"— HEIB APPARENT. 

AN OPULENT GROWTH. 

Under the census of 1900 West Virginia numbered 
near a million souls, and now, a year later, no doubt the 
million mark has been reached. Its statistics show an even 
larger growth in commerce and development. Among the 
coal-mining States, it is already third, and the production 
steadily increases. In no State in the Union has the tide 
of prosperity risen higher. From all sources — the local 
press, private correspondence, newspaper intelligence, the 
testimony of tourists and visitors — comes the uniform re- 
port of an opulent, unprecedented development, present 
and prospective, of the natural riches of this region, so 
long locked from the world of business enterprise by the 
repulsive policy of Old Virginia. While these last pages 
are being written, a local paper comes to hand with the 
statement that sixty-three railroads are at this time (No- 
vember, 1901), proposed and under construction within 
the State, ranging in length from ten miles to sixty. The 
same paper contains the Thanksgiving proclamation of 
Governor White, wherein he says : 

We are truly a favored people among the nations of the 
world, and the citizens of no State in the Union have more abund- 
ant reasons for thanksgiving than those of West Virginia. Our 

614 



THE TIDE COMING IN. 615 

national prosperity has been very great, and we have been 
shielded from pestilence and distress. Our State has probably 
been blessed above all others in the progress of material develop- 
ment and in the increased production of the great riches with 
which God has favored us. 

The happy geographical position of West Virginia, her 
genial climate; her riches in soil, coal, stone, timber, iron 
and oil, will make her another Pennsylvania in industry, 
wealth and population; and her fine school system, 
crowned by the University at Morgantown, assures an in- 
tellectual growth adapted to the natural aptitude of her 
people. 

Until after the War of the Rebellion, the territory em- 
braced in West Virginia had but one railroad ; and that 
corporation being devoted primarily to the enrichment and 
glorification of one family, it did not promote a policy of 
local improvements. Unfriendly legislative control at the 
head of James River also discouraged and retarded devel- 
opment of the West in srnj direction. The ex-Confederate 
control of the JSTew State for twenty years was also a check 
on immigration and enterprise; which made some progress, 
however, in spite of it. Railroad extension in this terri- 
tory, especially rapid within a few years, has put a differ- 
ent face on the transportation and industrial situation 
within its borders and is opening the State's resources to 
the eager quest of outside enterprise and capital. Great as 
the progress has been since the infant was baptised thirty- 
eight years ago, it has only begun. All the rich valleys 
lying between the Ohio and the Alleghenies are destined to 
be traversed by lines of rail which will carry to waiting 
markets West, South, Xortli and' East her crops, cattle, 



016 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

sheep, wool, fruit, timber ; the products of her mines and 
the oil in her subterranean caverns, which have lain hid- 
den since creation waiting for their hour to come. 

Looking to the far-away future, one sees these beauti- 
ful hills and valleys stripped of nature's adornment; the 
hills denuded of their forests, the valleys lighted by the 
flames of coke-ovens and smelting furnaces; their vegeta- 
tion seared and blackened with soot and gases; derricks 
rising like skeletons along the streams in company with 
tanks of petroleum, waiting to tempt (if not already cap- 
tured by) the Standard's millions; yawning mines and 
piles of slack disfiguring the once pleasing landscape — 
and one could -wish that such an Arcadia might have been 
spared such ravishment. But the needs of the race are 
insatiable and unceasing. They must be supplied; and 
one after another the reserves stored by nature in the hid- 
den places of the earth must be brought out to feed the 
perpetual hunger of the world's commerce. 

It would not be easy to give good reasons why a State 
whose progress can be only in the development of natural 
resources and in the fostering of industries allied to them 
should not ally itself with a ISTational policy calculated to 
promote such home interests ; yet the party of free-trade 
and pro-slavery traditions held West Virginia solid for 
nearly twenty-five years. The Republican control of the 
first half dozen years succeeding the erection of the State 
was due largely to exceptional circumstances: the over- 
throw of the rebellion, the dominance for the time of the 
loyal element even where not in distinct majority, the ex- 
clusion of the ex-Confederates from political functions and 
the moral subjugation of others who had sympathized with 



stactNATion stirred. 617 

the insurrection but kept out of it. Save along the north- 
ern and western borders, the population of Western Vir- 
ginia had a large leaven of secession. The pro-slavery virus 
of Old Virginia was strong in the educated and wealthier 
classes. The prejudice was both political and social — the 
social bias even stronger than the political. Grazing and 
small farming had been the chief occupations for genera- 
tions. These interests bred a pastoral and provincial tem- 
per in districts away from the towns and from the solitary 
railroad, whose people looked askance at the "outlanders" 
of the manufacturing towns along the border. Lawyers 
and office-holders shaped the j)olitical feeling in these pas- 
toral districts ; and they were very generally in sympathy 
with the regime at Richmond, which from time imme- 
morial had beeh devoted to the interests of their peculiar 
institution and in more recent years dominated by men in 
sympathy with the dream of a great slave empire rapidly 
ripening into cons]3irac3'' and revolt. It takes time for any 
people to recast all their ideas down to fundamental bases. 
War is an iconoclast ; it is a rapid teacher of new lessons ; 
but no part of any country's population is so slow to learn 
as the dwellers in remote mountain districts, away from 
the activities of commerce and the attrition of travel. 

But at last the stagnation in West Virginia hills has 
been stirred. Forty years of disconnection from Old 
Virginia and pro-slavery influences are showing their 
fruits. Even in the heads of the hollows, the "moss-backs" 
are being hustled out of their hibernation and jostled by 
the business world that has come along with money to buy 
their timber lands and mineral rights. Their country is 
being invaded and overrun again a good deal as it was in 



618 THE RENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

1861. But the arguments are not so summary, the weapons 
less deadly than then ; and in the gleam of Northern gold 
and the rustle of "Abolition" greenbacks, the resolutions 
of '98 and other dicta of the earlier Jefferson — as illus- 
trated by the later — are fading from memory and losing 
interest ; while the vulgar ambitions of the modern world, 
eager for riches and power, are — sadly be it said — replac- 
ing the fine old abstractions of the fine old Virginians 
which once filled so large a place in the political specula- 
tions of this fringe of Southland. The few who still resent 
this intrusion of the outside rude and jostling world into 
their sacred preserves are being outclassed and elbowed 
aside. The children are being won away from the abstrac- 
tions of the fathers to the gospel of business and money- 
making. To the ideal sense, the change is a loss ; but out 
of consideration for the practical bread-and-butter-eating 
and clothes-wearing world — considering that children are 
all the while being born which have to be fed and clothed 
and old people all the while dying who have to be buried, 
that vulgar money will do both, but political abstractions 
neither — the change is one to rejoice in. 

I can fancy how some of the old-time cattle-kings in 
Harrison would resent the encroachment of strangers rang- 
, ing over their pastures looking for oil or coal, frightening 
the herds of sleek, mild-eyed steers which gather around 
in wonder and alarm ready to break into a stampede in 
which they would run off many a pound of their tender 
flesh, if no worse disaster hai^pened them. Alas, that even 
royalty should have its price! Under the Midas touch, 
the generous pastures nourish the fat steer no longer. He 
has gone to market for the last time from manv a district 



THE DELUGE OF '70. 619 

once given over to his summer haunt ; and the oil-derrick 
rises or the coke-oven blazes where he used to graze and 
browse beside the brook in the early morning and cool him- 
self in its pools in the heat of midday. 

Already the peaceful seclusion of those hills and vales 
is a thing of the past. The timber-hunters, the oil-explor- 
ers, the coal-buyers, the projectors of new railroads, the 
seekers after cheap lands for homes or for investment, are 
everywhere; and railroad locomotives are sticking their 
noses into most unexpected places. The old people who 
have the stuff to sell — who had not expected to be disturbed 
in their time, but are not proof against the seductions of 
lucre when it comes their way — are shaken up as never 
before. It is a peaceful but mighty revolution; a trans- 
formation which in a few years will put capital and com- 
merce into domination in this young Commonwealth ; and 
will, I am sorry to add, give its great natural wealth to 
the further enrichment of combinations and trusts unless 
its people and Legislatures be possessed of a wisdom and 
virtue not to be found in any other part of the world. 

Thirty years ago the party barriers which had hedged 
in the Republican administration of the State, weakened 
by the unwillingness of a large and influential element in 
the Republican party to continue the policy of disabilities 
inherited from the war, gave way before the pressure of 
the ex-Confederate flood. The waters prevailed for near a 
quarter of a century. At length they have somewhat as- 
suaged, and there is reason to think the ark of progress has 
found solid ground ; that the dark ages for the State are 
past ; that a policy of enlightened self-interest has da^vned. 
There was nothing surprising in the reaction following the 



620 THE BENDING OF VIRGINIA. 

war. Political reactions are part of the history of every 
country. After the high moral tension under Cromwell 
and the Commonwealth, how England, under the dissolute 
rule of the second Charles, "the Merry," rioted and wal- 
lowed in the mire of vice and immorality. After the Jaco- 
l)in September and Kobespierre, came Bonaparte w'ith his 
"whilf of grapeshot," — the Directory — the Emj)ire. The 
c'x-Confederate domination in West Virginia vvas the in- 
evitable swing from one extreme to the other. In a large 
sense, it was not specially to be deplored. It has not been 
without its compensation ; for it gave the reactionists an 
opportunity to show^ how^ they were wedded tO'their Ancient 
idols; how unequal they were to the demands of the new 
era succeeding the extirpation of slavery and the policies 
it fostered ; to show also their incapacity and lack of prin- 
ciple. A single instance will illustrate. In their revision 
of the State constitution on old-fogy and ex-Confederate 
lines in 1872, they wholly omitted the provision of the 
first constitution requiring the State«to assume its equitable 
share of the Virginia debt and to make settlement with 
Virginia, so that share might be ascertained and provided 
for. This was one of the prime conditions upon which 
Congress had passed the bill of admission and upon which 
President Lincoln had approved it. The matter was not 
overlooked by this Convention. It was discussed, and the 
omission was intentional. This left the State without 
any recognition of that obligation ; left the Legislature 
without authority to act respecting it ; and left West Vir- 
ginia in the attitude of deliberate repudiation. Notice of 
the fact was taken a few months ago at the world's finan- 
cial center and West Virginia posted, along with Missis- 
sippi and Louisiana, as a repudiator. 



o:nwakd axd upward. 621 

The narrowness and the bitterness of that time are 
passing away. In future, intelligent business administra- 
tion will be demanded of any party that may control the 
State. The people who have chosen ''Montani semper 
liberi" for their motto have, in common with the rest of 
the modern world, put their hand to the plow. Some of 
them may at times look back with longing for the ''flesh- 
pots;" may sometimes sit down and lament, as the chil- 
dren of Israel did by the rivers of Ballon ; but time and 
tide will not wait for them, and, however reluctant, they 
will have to fall in and move on with the column. 

If West Virginia shall be true to the high purposes of 
her founders — to the protection of her citizenship, to the 
preservation of public faith — she ought to be henceforth 
one of the most inviting fields in the world for capital and 
energy. She has had her great political reaction ; has risen 
from the slough ; has shaken off the Circean spell of slav- 
ery, and should henceforward advance along wiser and 
broader ways to an imperial destiny. 




622 THE BENDING OF VIRGINIA. 



IN WEST VIRGINIA. 



In West Virginia skies are blue. 
The hills are green and hearts are true; 
A joyous welcome waiteth you, 
In West Virginia. 

In West Virginia skies are bright. 
The twinkling stars make glad the night; 
And noble hearts uphold the right, 
In West Virginia. 

In West Virginia happy beams 
The sun that kisses crystal streams; 
Enduring love is what is seems, 
In West Virginia. 

In West Virginia there is rest 
For tempest-tossed and sore distressed; 
Here loving hearts are ever blest, 
In W6st Virginia. 

In West Virginia man is free; 
He dwells beneath his own roof tree; 
Oh come, my love, and dwell with me. 
In West Virginia. 

— H. L. Swisher, in "Briar Blossoms,** 



DAUGHTER OF THE ELM, 

PRESS AND OTHER COMMENT. 



(From Wheeling Intelligencer, November 29, 1899.) 

NEW WEST VIEGINIA AUTHOR. 

West Virginia's products are not confined to coal, timber, 
coke, iron and oil. Many of her sons and daughters shine in 
the circles of polite literature and ethics, and none, we are 
sure, will take higher rank in these than Mr. Granville Davis- 
son Hall, who announces the publication of a novel from his 
pen about Christmas, entitled "Daughter of the Elm, a Tale of 
the Virginia Border Before the War." 

The atmosphere of the work is local, the scene being laid 
in the upper Monongahela Valley, and the work promises to re- 
call forgotten tragedies in which some real people and events 
figure. Mr. Hall is a graceful and interesting writer, and his 
debut as a writer of fiction will, no doubt, add to a reputation 
already secured in the State of his birth and in communities 
of his former activity. 



(From Wheeling Intelligencer, December 20, 1899.) 

"daughter of the elm." 

Some weeks ago the Intelligencer had occasion to anticipate 
the publication of the novel written by a West Virginian, who 
has been long absent from the State, but who has never lost 
his interest in a community where the power and gracefulness 
of his pen instructed and interested the people of nearly a 
generation ago. * * • The book is just now from the press, 
and after examining its attractive pages, we are sure the read- 
ing public will be edified and entertained in perusing the vol- 
ume. Its power and recommendation to public interest do not lie 
altogether in the local atmosphere that is imparted to the story 
told. Nor do the historical facts around which are woven the 
romantic tale form the basis of its chief merit, for it is clever 
in plot, graceful in diction and charming in style. The char- 
acters who figure in it were real people, and the love story that 
illumines the pages serves as a foil to the tragical lines. 

624 



(From Wheeling Intelligencer, December 21, 1899.) 

THE NEW WEST VIRGINIA NOVEL. 

The new West Virginia novel, the "Daughter of the Elm," 
had a big run at Frank Stanton's Old City Book Store yester- 
day. There are only a few copies left of the first invoice. Those 
who have read the work pronounce it on« of the most en- 
tertaining volumes of fiction yet put upon the literary market. 

(From the Clarksburg Telegram, December 23, 1899.) 

The "Daughter of the Elm" is graphically written and in- 
tensely interesting, especially to those living in the Monongahela 
Valley. The beautiful spreading tree on the west side of the 
river, a short distance below Shinnston, is the elm referred to 
by the author. Many of the names differ so little from the 
real characters, and the fiction and fact so easily blend, that the 
reader can readily determine them. The book is a reproduction 
of life in and around Shinnston, as seen by the author when a 
youth. While fictitious names are largely resorted to, yet 
there are many persons now living who, being more or less 
acquainted with the mysteries of the gang of inferred villains 
he so cleverly portrays, readily recognize them and point out 
some of them as living today in this county. While the prin- 
cipal power of the work in this immediate neighborhood is its 
features of local history, yet its cleverness in plot, its grace- 
ful diction and its charming style command respectful atten- 
tion by the general public, and it is a story that will be read 
with interest anywhere. As a revivor of whispered tragedies of 
long ago, now almost forgotten, it is already a great success in 
this community, as attested by the popular sale it has found 
and by the reminiscences already being indulged in by our 
older citizens. 



It is a representation of life about forty years ago in the 
upper Monongahela region, and will create something of a sen- 
sation in that locality, as some of the characters drawn with 
thin veil are still living and will be easily recognized. One 
resided here in Pittsburg within the memory of many. The 
cleverness in plot, its graceful diction and good style will com- 
mand attention from beginning to finish. 

PiTTSBUKG (Society) Bulletin. 



I received the "Daughter of the Elm" by today's mail and, 
regardless of failing eyes, read it through at one sitting to- 
night, with profound pleasure. You have succeeded well in 
your initial effort at story writing. 

Capt. T. B. a. David, Pittsburgh, Pa. 

Va. 40 625 



Your "Daughter of the Elm" has interested me greatly. I 
am familiar with the localities mentioned, and know of my own 
knowledge, and from other independent and authentic sources, 
that the story is founded upon a basis of fact. 

James E. Brown, Attorney, Chicago. 



I have read your "Daughter of the Elm" with much interest, 
and could not lay it down until I had taken in the whole story. 
You certainly would have been a success in the line of a detec- 
tive, and your description of the feelings existing between St. 
George and Loraine is both natural and beautiful. 

Hon. J. H. Atkinson, New Cumberland, W. Va. 



I became very much interested in it at any rate because the 
whole of the transactions and incidents are located in a section 
of country pretty well known to. me. Many of the persons 
named were acquaintances of my younger days. The book 
gave me so much interest that everything else was laid by until 
I had finished it. 

Judge J. M. McWhoeter, Greenbrier Circuit, W. Va. 



I have read the "Daughter of the Elm," with very great 
pleasure and interest, and I have heard others speak of it in very 
flattering terms. 

Hon. J. A. Macauley, Pension Dept., Washington. 



And when the evening mail brought the eagerly looked for 
"Daughter of the Elm," I soon became oblivious to about every- 
thing else until its pages were all perused — before retiring. 

Rev. Leroy P. Fortney, Plainfield, Vt. 



Allow me to congratulate you on your book. The story is 
beautifully told and very interesting. 

M. B. Orde, Pres. Vil. of Glencoe. 



Let me thank you for myself and family for the pleasure you 
have afforded us. Heaton Owsley, Chicago. 



One of the most entertaining novels I have ever read. 

Dr. John Nutt, San Diego, Cal. 



Loraine, the pure and beautiful creature who grew up into 
a noble womanhood surrounded by all the harrowing scenes 
that saddened her youth, is a character that is entitled to a 
high place in literature." Ravenswood (W. Va.) News. 



The "Big Elm," made famous by the notoriety given it by 
the "Daughter of the Elm," is the Mecca for a great many 
visitors to our city. Shinnston (W. Va.) News. 



One of the prettiest things in the way of a dainty volume 
laid on the book table of this paper is the "Daughter of the Elm." 
The story is of great interest to West Virginia readers, for it is 
graphically written and portrays scenes which are said to have 
largely actually occurred in the valley of the Upper Monongahela. 
Mr. Hall certainly wields a graceful and effective pen. His work 
.in the "Daughter of the Elm" entitles him to a high place among 
the writers of fiction in this country. His work has been 
favorably received and criticized all over the country. 

Paekersburg Daily State Journal, 



The book is most attractively written and deals with deeds 
of crime and daring and recklessness of a certain desperate gang 
who are said to have made that neighborhood notorious during 
the fifties, and the author has employed enough fiction to make 
his work readable. Many places up the West Fork are so ac- 
curately described as to be readily located; and while fictitious 
names are mainly used, many of the old residents of that 
locality are mentioned. The book will be widely read in this 
section and we predict for it an immense sale. 

Fairmont Index. 

I think I recognize most of the characters who are given 
fictitious names and personally acquainted with some of them 
as well as nearly all of those whose real names are given. I 

was born in '60 and did not know , and some 

of the others, but the incidents, or similar ones, I have heard 

spoken of at home in a kind of traditionary manner. 

(George Holmes) was a cousin of my mother's, and Uncle Andy 

(Morrow) is my great uncle. "Old Black Joe," Daddy 

Long's servant, lived for several years on my father's farm. I 

was well acquainted with . My father owns and has 

lived on the old Higginbotham farm adjoining Peter B. Righter's 
place since '71. Capt. John Righter owns a mill just below 
Worthington. 

I wish to congratulate you on your book. It will certainly 
reach a great sale. I do not pretend to be a critic but it seems 
to me to contain all the elements of a successful story. 

L. E. Strum, Waverly, Ohio. 

627 



I was very much interested in the book. It took me back 
to the old times; but, of course, some of the things occurred 
after I left there. You did splendid work in describing Old Joe 

(Diedrich). I had a good laugh over that. 

Mrs. E. J. Nay, Princeton, 111. 



Prom a letter of Mrs. Elizabeth Nay of Princeton, 111., to 
the Shinnston, (W. Va.) News: 

"Since my old school mate, G. D. Hall, has written 'Daugh- 
ter of the Elm,' I have been transported in my mind back to 
the old home many times. * * * My father was the old ferry- 
man in Mr. Hall's book." 



I am not much of a novel reader, but I can assure you that 
the perusal of your work afforded me very much pleasure. 

Samuel Sinton, Richmond, Va. 



I have read the "Daughter of the Elm" with great interest. 
It deals admirably with a long-neglected field of literature. 
Such books as yours, "The Latimores," by Dr. McCook, "The 
White Rocks," by Mrs. A. A. Hill, will in time be followed by 
a flood of others dealing with the Upper Ohio Valley, a most 
prolific and hitherto untouched field of romance and story. 
Your descriptions are fine and give exact ideas of rural life in 
those days in the section you deal with." 

Wm. Gilbert Irwin, Pittsburgh Clipper. 



The story is graphically and easily told, and the detective 
work is fairly done under the circumstances. The girl, Loraine, 
is like a pure white lily growing into sweet womanhood amidst 
evil surroundings, and her gentle counsels and steadfastness are 
rewarded at last. Literary World, Boston. 



It is a representation of life about forty years ago in the 
Upper Monongahela region, and will create something of a 
sensation in that locality, as some of the characters drawn with 
thin veil are still living and will be easily recognized. One re- 
sided here in Pittsburg within the memory of many. The clever- 
ness in plot, its graceful diction and good style will command 
attention from beginning to finish. 

Pittsburgh (Society) Bulletin. 



Your book is very interesting, and the children and myself 
have all read it and greatly enjoyed it. It contains some very 
delightful pages. Dr. B. W. Griffin, Arlington, 111. 



He writes easily and his characters are consistently handled 
throughout the story. The exciting story impresses one with 
unmistakable proof that its characters are from life, and herein 
lies the strength of the work. A pretty love story adds interest 
to a tale that does not lack for stirring situations. 

Highland Park, III., News Letter. 



It is a skillfully told, realistic stirring story, and the author 
is manifestly well acquainted with the people and the scenes 
in which their actions are set. Pittsburgh Times. 



The story tells of the depredations of a lawless band in the 
West Virginia hills and contains many thrilling situations. 
There is also a pretty love story running through the narrative 
which greatly adds to its interest. 

Pittsburgh Commercial-Gazette. 



141 Beacon Street, Boston, Mass. 
My Dear Mr. Hall: January 12, 1900. 

That is a good book of yours, "Daughter of the Elm," and 
contrary to my conservative habits, I sat up late the other 
night in order to finish it. You sketch the story with a master 
hand. It is told so freshly and plainly as to have all the 
interest of news, while at the same time it has all the charm of 
romance. I like, too, the very human way in which the destinies 
of your characters are arranged. In fact,, it is evident that, 
like all the strongest work in fiction, yours is embroidered on 
fact. I congratulate you on your success. 

H. D. Lloyd. 
(Author of works on Political Economy.) 



Certainly you have "dipped you pen in the pigments of 
life." There is real life, action and interest in every page; and 
I find myself wondering even with the real to back you, how 
you manage to make it so real. * * * The story haunts me 
and the characters follow me as if of my own brain or acquaint- 
ance. Mrs. Irene Saffobd, (Litterateur.) 



Many, many thanks for your book. I cannot find words 
to tell you how I enjoyed reading it. I recognize most of the 
characters and places. It carried me "back to Old Virginny." 
My great grandfather, David Wamsley, owned the Elm farm 
over a hundred years ago; and it was said it was he who planted 
the tree. While visiting in West Virginia five years ago, I went 
to see it. Mrs. Matilda Shinn Boggess, La Harpe, 111. 

629 



(St. Louis Globe-Democrat, December, 31. 1899.) 

That truth is stranger than fiction, we have long been told 
but few who speak the truth have ventured to claim that it is 
quite as interesting. An author, therefore, who can make the 
nice connection and give you a tale as true as truth, yet deli- 
ciously thrilling as intensest fiction, is not one to be ignored. 
Granville Davisson Hall is a new writer — in the line of romance 
— yet he has brought into the field a little "foundling," as he 
puts it, with such wide eyes of truth and shining garments of 
adventure, that life and story are at one with each other in the 
interest he awakens. * * * Nor could "The Daughter of a 
Hundred Earls" display more fineness of soul and fiber than 
stamps its gentle heroine though born to gross and criminal 
surroundings. * * * The master stroke of the book, however, is 
not in the delineation of character, nor cleverness of plot, nor 
striking situations strong as all these points are, but in the re- 
markable manner in which the author has stamped it with that 
impress of truth which is at once the dream and despair of all 
writers. That everything happened as he relates it, even to the 
slightest incident or most thrilling detail, is the inevitable con- 
viction of the reader. * * * The dainty touch which permits 
the finer gold of the ideal to shine through in the mother's 
christening of her first born is worthy of a life artist. 



Daughter of the Elm 

A TALE OF WEST VIRGINIA 



BY MAIL, POSTPAID 
$1.00 



Send Orders to 

A. C. HALL, 

GLENCOE, ILL. 



630 



FEB 1 1902 

! CC'Y DEL. TO CAT. DiV. 
rrn 1 1902 



FEB. 4 ??r? 












LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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